According to Reuters, French Finance Minister Roland Lescure stated on Friday that Europe requires more euro-based stablecoins and that EU banks should investigate tokenized deposits. This announcement marks a potential shift in the French government's and its central bank's stance on digital currencies. Lescure expressed his support for Qivalis, a consortium of 12 European banks, including BBVA, ING, UniCredit, and BNP Paribas, which plans to launch a euro-pegged stablecoin in the second half of 2026 to counter US dominance in digital payments.
"This is what we need, and this is what we want," Lescure said, also encouraging banks to explore the launch of tokenized deposits further. He noted that the relatively low volume of euro-pegged stablecoins compared to dollar-pegged ones is "unsatisfactory." The previous Finance Minister, Bruno Le Maire, had taken a strict stance against privately issued fiat-pegged cryptocurrencies, considering them a threat to national sovereignty.
More recently, Bank of France Governor Francois Villeroy de Galhau warned that stablecoins and tokenized private money could lead to the privatization of money and a loss of monetary sovereignty.