Germany widens MiCA lead with six new cooperative bank licenses

Germany added six cooperative banks to the European Union's MiCA authorization register on Friday, pushing its total number of licensed crypto asset service providers to 79. The European Securities and Markets Authority updated its interim register, raising the count of authorized CASPs across the bloc to 331, crypto.news reported.

The six new entries are all German cooperative banks: Raiffeisenbank Aidlingen, Ihre Volksbank, VR Bank Mittelfranken Mitte, Volksbank Euskirchen, VR Bank Ried Überwald and Volksbank Backnang. Germany now has more than twice as many authorized providers as France, which ranks second with 35. The Netherlands follows with 29.

The latest additions extend a trend that began before MiCA's transitional arrangements ended on July 1. Germany held 57 licensed providers in late June, about 23% of the EU total at the time. Since then the country has added 22 authorized CASPs while the European register increased by 87. By July 23 ESMA had recorded 309 authorized providers, including four German entries and BNY's Belgian banking subsidiary, which received authorization for crypto custody and transfer services.

Germany's cooperative banking sector has also started offering direct crypto access to retail customers. DZ Bank rolled out crypto trading through participating cooperative banks in July, crypto.news reported. DZ Bank received BaFin approval under MiCA in January for its meinKrypto platform after about a year of trials. The service supports Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin and Cardano, with Boerse Stuttgart Digital handling custody. Customers can buy and sell digital assets through their existing banking relationships without opening separate exchange accounts.

The authorization numbers reflect the size of Germany's financial sector and the number of credit institutions eligible to provide crypto services, BaFin told Cointelegraph in June. Germany classified crypto custody as a regulated financial service before MiCA became fully applicable, which meant providers already operating under the national framework could use simplified procedures when seeking EU authorization.

MiCA introduced a common authorization system for crypto service providers across EU member states. Once a national competent authority approves a CASP, the provider can use passporting rights to offer covered services in other EU countries after completing a notification process. MiCA covers custody, operation of trading platforms, exchange of crypto assets for funds or other crypto assets, execution of client orders, portfolio management and transfer services.

The regulation entered full application at the end of 2024. Transitional arrangements allowed companies operating under earlier national regimes to continue for a limited period, with a final deadline of July 1, 2026. Providers without the required authorization could no longer rely on previous national registrations after their transition periods expired, earlier reporting said.

While the CASP list has grown, ESMA made no changes in its latest update to the datasets covering asset-referenced tokens, electronic money tokens and noncompliant entities. The asset-referenced token register remained empty, the electronic money token register held 43 entries, and the noncompliant entity list stayed at 167. The CASP register rose from 244 on June 29 to 309 by July 23 before reaching 331 in the latest update.

Regulatory work has shifted to supervising companies that have received licenses. In July ESMA launched a review of MiCA-authorized crypto custodians covering custody controls, key management, incident response procedures and risks involving third party service providers. For the latest German additions, ESMA's register identifies the six cooperative banks as entries added since Aug. 12.