Coinbase to halt USDC earn program citing regulatory hurdles in the EU region

Popular American Crypto exchange Coinbase decided to terminate its USDC earn service for the MiCA-compliant regions.

Coinbase is a US-based San Francisco headquartered blockchain firm, popular for its highly regulated crypto trading services. This crypto exchange provides multiple types of crypto-focused services to retail as well as institutional investors. The services of this crypto exchange are available globally in more than 100 countries.

On 29 Nov 2024, Coinbase exchange informed that it will remove its USDC earn program feature for its customers belonging to the regions, where Markets In Crypto Assets (MiCA) will be implemented.
So to comply with MiCA, Coinbase will terminate its USDC yield service. As MiCA’s new phase of regulation will come into effect from 1 Dec 2025, so within a couple of days, this decision will come into effect.

Coinbase, USDC, & yield program

10 days ago, on 20 Nov 2024, Coinbase launched its USDC yield program to allow its customers to earn a 4.7% return on holding USDC in the wallet on the chain.

This is a very big disappointment for all those EU-based Coinbase customers who were eager to make passive income by holding their stablecoin funds in the Coinbase ecosystem.

Notably, this year, the majority of the crypto companies introduced multiple changes in their crypto services to comply with MiCA.
In particular, Coinbase decided in October of this year that it would remove all non-compliant stablecoins from its platform. Bitstamp crypto trading platform removed Tether’s euro-pegged stablecoin Tether EURt (EURt), as this stablecoin was not meeting MiCA requirements. On the other hand, the Binance exchange planned to limit services related to unregulated stablecoins in June.

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