MiCA Recital (19) — preamble

(19) At present, despite their similarities, electronic money and crypto-assets referencing an official currency differ in some important aspects. Holders of electronic money as defined in Directive 2009/110/EC are always provided with a claim against the electronic money issuer and have a contractual right to redeem, at any moment and at par value, the monetary value of the electronic money held. By contrast, some crypto-assets referencing an official currency do not provide their holders with such a claim against the issuers of such crypto-assets and could fall outside the scope of Directive 2009/110/EC. Other crypto-assets referencing an official currency do not provide a claim at par value with the currency they are referencing or they limit the redemption period. The fact that holders of such crypto-assets do not have a claim against the issuers of such crypto-assets, or that such claim is not at par value with the currency those crypto-assets are referencing, could undermine the confidence of holders of those crypto-assets. Accordingly, to avoid circumvention of the rules laid down in Directive 2009/110/EC, any definition of e-money tokens should be as wide as possible to capture all types of crypto-assets referencing a single official currency. In addition, strict conditions on the issuance of e-money tokens should be laid down, including an obligation for e-money tokens to be issued either by a credit institution authorised under Directive 2013/36/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council (13), or by an electronic money institution authorised under Directive 2009/110/EC. For the same reason, issuers of e-money tokens should ensure that holders of such tokens can exercise their right to redeem their tokens at any time and at par value against the currency referencing those tokens. Because e-money tokens are crypto-assets and can raise new challenges in terms of protection of retail holders and market integrity that are specific to crypto-assets, they should also be subject to the rules laid down in this Regulation to address those challenges.