Paolo Ardoino, CEO of stablecoin issuer Tether, addressed criticism over the company’s decision not to seek registration under the European Union’s Markets in Crypto-Assets (MiCA) framework, arguing that the regulations were risky for stablecoins.

Speaking to Cointelegraph at the Token2049 conference in Dubai, Ardoino reiterated that Tether had no plans to apply for its US dollar-pegged stablecoin USDt — the largest by market capitalization — to be compliant under MiCA in European countries, potentially forcing exchanges to delist the stablecoin. He added that though crypto firms had to follow regulations, there was a “fear of compliance” among companies in the EU.

“[…] MiCA license is very dangerous when it comes to stablecoins, and I believe that is even more dangerous for the small, medium banking system in Europe,” said the Tether CEO, adding that banks in the region could “go belly up” in the next few years thanks to MiCA’s requirements, such as keeping 60% of stablecoins reserves in insured cash deposits in European banks. Ardoino added:

“I decided to not apply to the MiCA license because I need to protect the 400 million+ users that we have around the world. They are not as lucky as Europeans. I love Europe, but I think that unfortunately European Central Bank is more interested [in pushing] the digital euro as a way to control people and control how they spend their money.”

Related: Paolo Ardoino: Competitors and politicians intend to ‘kill Tether’

After years of planning and research, EU officials began to implement requirements under MiCA in December 2024. Tether, which is regulated and headquartered in El Salvador, is required to comply with MiCA regulatory requirements if offering products or services in EU member states.

Since the regulations went into effect, many crypto exchanges acted to ensure their platforms listed MiCA-compliant tokens. Kraken delisted 5 stablecoins, including USDt, and Crypto.com announced plans to delist 10 stablecoins as of January.

On nations establishing crypto reserves

Speaking on its intentions for operating in the United States, Ardoino said the country “would require a different type of product,” given the competition with local stablecoin issuers. He added that the US’s and other countries’ efforts to establish a Bitcoin (BTC) stockpile were “just inevitable.”

“In the medium to long term, the more Bitcoin education, the more companies will set the example […] then everyone else will follow,” said the Tether CEO. “It’s never too late to buy Bitcoin.”

Ardoino’s statements came the same day that Tether announced roughly $120 billion in exposure to US Treasurys as of the first quarter of 2025. As of May 1, USDt had a market capitalization of roughly $149 billion.

Magazine: Crypto wanted to overthrow banks, now it’s becoming them in stablecoin fight

Crypto exchange Coinbase has announced it will suspend trading of Movement Labs’ native token effective May 15.

The decision was shared in a May 1 post on X, with Coinbase citing the token’s failure to meet its listing standards. According to CoinMarketCap, the MOVE token declined by 13.6% in the last 24 hours. Coinbase announced:

“Trading for MOVE will be suspended on Coinbase, Simple and Advanced Trade, Coinbase Exchange, and Coinbase Prime. We have moved our MOVE order books to limit-only mode. Limit orders can be placed and canceled, and matches may occur.”

The trading suspension follows an ongoing investigation into Movement Labs over an agreement that allegedly influenced the MOVE token price.

Source: Coinbase

This is a developing story, and further information will be added as it becomes available.

A group of developers within the Ethereum ecosystem, operating independently of the Ethereum Foundation, have announced Ethereum R1 — a layer-2 (L2) scaling solution for the Ethereum network that does not include a native token.

According to the announcement, the project relies entirely on donations, does not have venture funding, and does not have any pre-mined token allocations or a governance token. The project’s team wrote in a May 1 X post:

“General-purpose L2s should be commodities — simple, replaceable, and free from centralized dependencies or risky governance. Ethereum R1 is our answer to that call — the rollup grounded in credible neutrality, decentralization, and censorship resistance.”

“Most L2s today are acting more like new L1s than an Ethereum scaling solution — private allocations, opaque governance, and centralized control,” the developers continued.

The announcement points to increasing concerns within the Ethereum community regarding the current direction of many layer-2 scaling solutions, which some view as potentially misaligned with the interests of the base layer

Related: Ethereum community members propose new fee structure for the app layer

Ethereum’s L2-centric approach: unique value proposition or exploitation?

Ethereum’s Dencun upgrade in March 2024 significantly lowered fees for its layer-2 networks. By September, revenue on the Ethereum base layer collapsed by 99%.

As a result, transaction costs on the Ethereum network base layer dropped to a five-year low of roughly $0.16 per transaction in April 2025, due to a lack of demand for block space on the base layer.

Ethereum’s transaction fees are determined by demand and network traffic — higher demand and network traffic translate into higher fees for the base layer and more revenue.

Ethereum’s base layer revenue collapsed in Q1 2025. Source: Token Terminal

While critics continue to argue that this provides perverse incentives for layer-2 networks to grow at the expense of the base layer, protocols continue to argue that Ethereum’s many layer-2 networks are a feature, not a bug.

Anurag Arjun, co-founder of the unified chain abstraction solution Avail, told Cointelegraph that Ethereum’s layer-2 approach gives users a virtually unlimited number of high-throughput chains to choose from, as opposed to the singular one-size-fits-all approach employed by monolithic blockchain protocols.

Magazine: Ethereum is destroying the competition in the $16.1T TradFi tokenization race