Appold Market Watch - Week ending 26 June 2026

Market Update & Industry News - Week ending 26 June 2026

🔷 OKX and Intercontinental Exchange (ICE), the owner of the NYSE, announced a 50:50 joint venture to develop tokenised securities, digital asset derivatives, and regulated market infrastructure, with former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo serving as co-chair.

Appold View: With OKX bringing distribution and product experience, and ICE adding credibility and exchange-grade infrastructure, there is potential to help turn tokenised securities and digital asset derivatives into genuinely liquid, institutionally adopted markets.

🔷 The Bank of England has published its final regulatory framework for sterling-denominated systemic stablecoins, expected to come into force in 2027. The regime requires issuers to maintain 1:1 backing with at least 30% in unremunerated central bank deposits and up to 70% in short-term UK government debt.

Appold View: The 30% unremunerated deposit requirement materially reduces issuer economics, making the UK regime safer but potentially less commercially attractive than jurisdictions that allow issuers to retain more reserve yield.

🔷 Binance has withdrawn its MiCA Crypto-Asset Service Provider (CASP) licence application in Greece to pursue authorisation in another EU Member State. The decision comes just days before the MiCA transition deadline on 1 July, after which any entity providing crypto-asset services to EU clients without a MiCA licence must cease offering those services.

Appold View: Binance previously held a DASP licence in France under the national regime, now superseded by MiCA. Rather than anchoring its MiCA application in France, Binance chose to pursue authorisation in Greece, despite Greece not yet having approved any CASP licences. One plausible reading is that Binance wanted to avoid France’s more assertive supervisory environment. However, with Reuters reporting that Greek authorities were minded to reject the application, Binance’s decision to withdraw appears like an attempt to save face. Either way, it is an embarrassing, still-unresolved licensing saga with real commercial implications if Binance is unable to secure a CASP licence beyond 1 July.

🔷 Poland has not yet enacted legislation to establish a domestic MiCA supervisory framework, which is needed for Polish firms to obtain a CASP licence. With the transitional period for MiCA expiring across the EU next week, Polish firms that want to continue offering MiCA-regulated services will need to obtain a CASP authorisation in another EU Member State and passport their services back into Poland, or wind down their services.

Appold View: Poland’s failure to advance a MiCA supervisory framework stems from ongoing political disagreement over how strict MiCA implementation should be. Ironically, the end result looks to be no implementation at all, to the detriment of domestic firms now unable to obtain a Polish CASP licence.

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