ESMA Adds 37 Crypto Firms to MiCA Register in First Post-Deadline Update
Europe's securities regulator expanded its MiCA-compliant register with 37 new crypto service providers, including Standard Chartered and FalconX.
The European Securities and Markets Authority has issued its first update to the Markets in Crypto-Assets register since the regulatory framework's compliance deadline passed, adding 37 crypto-asset service providers to the official list. Among the newly registered entities are Standard Chartered, one of the world's largest international banking groups, and FalconX, a prominent institutional crypto prime brokerage. The additions signal that major financial incumbents and crypto-native firms alike are actively pursuing regulatory legitimacy under Europe's landmark digital-asset rulebook.
MiCA represents the European Union's most comprehensive attempt to bring crypto markets under a unified supervisory framework, establishing licensing requirements, consumer protections, and operational standards for firms serving EU customers. The post-deadline nature of this register update is analytically significant: it suggests regulators are processing a backlog of applications that accumulated as the framework's provisions came fully into force, and that compliance pipelines remain active rather than stalled.
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The participation of a bank of Standard Chartered's stature underscores a broader institutional shift. Traditional financial players have historically approached crypto with caution, but the clarity that MiCA provides — compared with the fragmented, jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction approach seen elsewhere — appears to be accelerating their formal market entry in Europe. For FalconX and other crypto-native firms, MiCA authorization opens access to the EU's single market under a single passport, a commercially meaningful advantage.
With the register now expanding beyond its initial cohort, market observers will be watching whether the pace of additions accelerates as regulatory capacity catches up with application volume, and whether further global banking names follow Standard Chartered's lead into the framework. The trajectory of MiCA adoption could serve as a template — or a cautionary tale — for regulators in the United States and Asia who are still debating comparable crypto oversight regimes.
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