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Animoca Chairman Warns Europe Risks Dollar Colony via Stablecoins
Stablecoin volumes projected to hit $33 trillion in 2025, almost all dollar-pegged. Yat Siu says Europe must build a euro stablecoin or lose financial sovereignty.
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Yat Siu, co-founder and executive chairman of Animoca Brands, delivered a warning at the Global Digital Asset Forum in Vienna on January 26: Europe faces a sovereignty risk from its lack of a meaningful euro stablecoin. The mechanism is stablecoin-driven dollar dominance.
Stablecoins processed $27.6 trillion in transaction volume in 2024. That figure is projected to hit $33 trillion in 2025. Almost all of it flows through tokens pegged to the US dollar. Siu argued that the absence of a euro counterpart turns Europe into a consumer of American financial infrastructure rather than a builder of its own.
The $27.6 Trillion Dollar Network
Stablecoins have moved beyond crypto-native trading. The 2024 volume reflects growing use by traditional finance for settlement, treasury management, and cross-border payments. Each use case locks users into the currency denomination of the token. With virtually the entire stablecoin market pegged to the USD, every new user integrates into dollar-based digital rails.
Siu described stablecoins as an “onboarding mechanism” for broader digital assets like Bitcoin (BTC) and Ethereum (ETH). The logic is straightforward: a user enters via a stablecoin, then moves into other crypto. If that gateway token is denominated in dollars, the US dollar gains structural advantages in the digital asset economy – advantages that compound with each transaction.
The Volume Trajectory
The projected jump from $27.6 trillion to $33 trillion in 2025 implies the gap will widen. Europe's share of that volume is small. Siu's argument is that inertia is not neutral: every year without a euro-denominated stablecoin deepens the dollar's network effects in digital finance.
Regulation Ready, Product Missing
Europe's Markets in Crypto-Assets regulation (MiCA) is the most comprehensive crypto regulatory framework any major economy has produced. It gives stablecoin issuers a clear licensing path. No major euro-pegged stablecoin has emerged under MiCA.
Siu framed this as a sovereignty problem. Regulation without a product leaves Europe as a consumer of American financial infrastructure rather than a builder of its own. The risk to watch: MiCA could become a compliance burden for non-European issuers without creating a competitive European alternative.
What a Euro Stablecoin Would Change
A credible euro stablecoin would allow European businesses to settle cross-border payments, manage treasury, and interact with DeFi protocols in their home currency. It would reduce currency conversion costs and FX risk for European users. It would also position the euro as a settlement currency in digital markets, countering the dollar's current dominance.
Siu's own firm is proof that the capability exists outside Europe. Animoca Brands secured one of Hong Kong's first regulated stablecoin licenses through a partnership with Standard Chartered and HKT. That places Animoca alongside institutions like HSBC in Hong Kong's emerging stablecoin ecosystem. The model exists: regulated stablecoins linked to a major economy. Europe has the regulatory framework but not the execution.