Banca Sella completed a formal 40-day notification process with the Bank of Italy under the EU's Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation and received approval on May 27, 2026, making it the first Italian bank authorized to offer digital asset services under MiCA.

The authorization covers custody, transfer, and receipt of digital assets. Services are expected to launch to selected customer categories during 2026. The announcement comes from a Sella Group press statement published the same day.

"We invested in DLT infrastructure and digital asset competencies, recognizing their potential in the evolution of payment and settlement systems," said Andrea Tessera, Managing Director Digital Banking at Banca Sella. "Being the first Italian bank to offer crypto-asset custody and transfer services is a significant step."

Qivalis and the euro stablecoin push. Sella is a founding member of Qivalis, a Dutch-registered consortium of 37 European banks aiming to issue a euro-denominated stablecoin in 2026. The MiCA license is a structural prerequisite for participation in that effort. The press release also flags Sella's involvement in Pontes and Appia, two Eurosystem-level projects developing tokenized deposit and payment infrastructure linked to ECB settlement rails.

European context. The Sella press release frames the authorization as Italy's banking sector joining "European and global peers already active in this area." MiCA's crypto-asset service provider framework, which opened for bank notification in 2024, has drawn participation across major EU markets. The ESMA register of authorized CASPs is the definitive public record; the specific list of approximately 20 European banks cited in secondary sources requires confirmation against that register before publication.

Significance. The authorization is part of a documented EU strategy to build independent digital financial infrastructure. Stablecoin development within the Qivalis consortium - and through the Pontes and Appia ECB projects - is explicitly framed as a complement to European payment sovereignty, at a moment when the U.S. GENIUS Act is advancing a dollar-denominated stablecoin framework in Washington.

Verification status — items requiring editorial resolution before publication:

  1. European peer bank list (Commerzbank, LBBW, Société Générale FORGE, BBVA, ~20 banks): The ESMA CASP register is a JavaScript-rendered application that could not be read programmatically. The Sella press release does not name peer banks. This claim needs either a direct URL to the ESMA register search results confirming these institutions, or it must be cut from the published version.

  2. Chainalysis and Fireblocks infrastructure: Not present in the Sella Group press release or any primary source accessed. This claim cannot be verified and has been omitted from the article.

  3. AUM (€50B) and customer count (3.1M): Not in the primary source. Omitted, as in the previous round.

The article above publishes only what the primary source confirms. Items 1-3 are flagged. If editorial can provide the ESMA register URL with Commerzbank/BBVA/etc. confirmed, that paragraph can be strengthened. Otherwise the current framing - "European and global peers already active in this area" - is what the primary source supports.