Macron’s snap election throws Paris’ crypto scene into uncertainty – DL News

President Emmanuel Macron of France has long believed in crypto.

During his seven years in power, his government has taken numerous steps to reward founders with all kinds of incentives to set up shop in Paris’s burgeoning digital assets hub.

Now, France’s crypto industry may have to fend for itself.

The centre-right prime minister’s decision to hold a snap parliamentary election on June 30 has left the digital asset industry pondering a sudden shift in policy.

“It’s hard to say what’s next as the other political parties don’t have specific positioning on crypto,” said Daniel Seifert, Coinbase’s vice president and managing director in Europe and the Middle East.

Incoming crypto regulations

The election on June 30 and the run-off on July 7 will not end Macron’s five-year term – the presidential contest will not be held until 2027. But asking voters to elect a new National Assembly could lead to a majority led by the right-wing National Rally party, and a new prime minister.

This type of hybrid government is not unprecedented in French political history. But whichever party calls the shots domestically in July will have to engage with the new European Commission on incoming crypto regulations.

At the top of the list: the Markets in Crypto-Assets Act, which comes into full effect at the end of the year and will lay out the rules of the road for the industry.

As it happens, MiCA’s rules for stablecoins go into effect on June 30.

‘It created a lot of confidence for foreign actors to choose Paris. It is something that can disappear.’

— William O’Rorke, ORWL

“What remains of Macron’s legacy for the crypto industry in France remains to be seen, but his ambition has always been to make France an important crypto hub,” said Francois Volpoet, a regional managing director at the blockchain -analysis firm Chainalysis.

Starting in 2017, Macron’s administration opened the doors to investment in the sector. The government has rolled out favorable tax breaks for start-ups and incubation opportunities for investors. As a result, Paris’s crypto scene came alive.

Paris is home to several crypto unicorns, such as Ledger and Sorare, and sports a diverse web3 culture. The market regulator has registered more than 100 crypto firms.

Europe’s crypto industry regularly meets in the capital’s most illustrious venues, including the Louvre, the Ritz Paris hotel and the palatial Palais Brongniart, the city’s old stock exchange.

Bruno Le Maire, the finance minister, and Jean-Noël Barrot, the digitization minister, personally welcomed crypto giants such as Circle, Binance and Crypto.com as they set up shop in Paris.

“All these players had access to the top level of the Ministry of Economy,” said William O’Rorke, a lawyer at ORWL, a local law firm that represents crypto businesses.

“This is important because it created a lot of confidence for foreign actors to choose Paris to set up. It’s something that can disappear.”

But O’Rorke doesn’t imagine there will be direct regulatory changes based on the outcome of the June election.

Many industry players remain unaffected by which party’s rules.

The European Parliament’s Renew party, which represents Macron, won just 15% of the vote on Sunday. The far-right Identity and Democracy led the polls with more than 31%. In France, this group is represented by the National Rally party.

Slight shift

While the center was largely held in Brussels, the crypto industry is trying to gauge how Sunday’s results could affect the industry across the bloc.

“The slight shift to the right could potentially see a greater focus over the next five years on competitiveness and growth,” said Mark Foster, EU policy leader at the Crypto Council for Innovation.

“This could lead to a more enabling framework for innovation-friendly policies.”

The left-wing Green Party took a hit by losing 18 seats in the European Parliament.

“The European Parliament can reduce the focus that has been around Bitcoin and the energy consumption of proof-of-work mechanisms,” said Tommaso Astazi, head of regulatory affairs at Blockchain for Europe.

The elections also saw the return of some of the lawmakers who helped shape the EU’s crypto policy in the last mandate.

They include German center-right lawmaker Stefan Berger and Czech lawmaker Ondrej Kovarik, both of whom helped author MiCA.

“We will still have some of our closest members of the European Parliament, those we have worked with for the past five years,” Astazi said.

Inbar Preiss is DL News’ Brussels correspondent. Contact the author at [email protected].