More MiCA-licensed crypto firms could still leave the EU market, Gate Europe CEO says

Crypto firms that have already secured a MiCA (Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation) license are not necessarily safe from the economics of the regime, Gate Europe CEO Giovanni Cunti told Cointelegraph. The practical issue for PSPs and crypto operators is simple: getting licensed is one hurdle; carrying the ongoing compliance bill is another.

1. Speaking on Cointelegraph’s Chain Reaction on Monday, Cunti said the new framework is making it harder for entrants to compete and may force some licensed firms out of the EU market anyway. His view was blunt: “I think there are going to be quite a few more of the ones that acquire MiCA license that will not be capable to sustain the cost and the resources that are needed to carry on this business in the long term,” he said.
2. MiCA’s 18-month transition period ended on July 1, which means crypto firms serving EU customers now need authorization or must stop offering regulated services. That deadline already pushed several exchanges to restrict or withdraw services in parts of Europe, while others began operating under the new regime.
3. Binance, the world’s largest crypto exchange by trading volume, was not able to secure a MiCA license before the deadline. For market participants, that is the useful signal: even the biggest brands are not exempt from the licensing timetable, and service continuity now depends on the local authorization stack, not just brand size.
4. On Friday, the European Securities and Markets Authority added 14 crypto-asset service providers (CASPs) to its register, bringing the total to 294 after adding 37 firms in ESMA’s first update following the July 1 transition deadline. So the market is still growing under MiCA, just not at the pace operators were used to before the rules tightened.
5. Cunti also said the higher compliance burden could push some startups and projects to jurisdictions with less restrictive rules instead of trying to navigate the EU regime. At the same time, he said the market is shrinking from “thousands of operators” to “hundreds,” which creates an opportunity for the firms that remain because customers do not want to lose access to the market.

The thing is that MiCA is doing two jobs at once: it is raising the bar for investor protection, and it is raising the cost of staying in the game. For PSPs, acquirers, and banking partners, that usually means more diligence on customers, more pressure on margins, and a cleaner but smaller counterparty universe.