Report: ECB President Personally Blocked Binance’s EU License

Greece's own finance minister reportedly had a different read on the case, a view that did not survive the ECB president's intervention. Christine Lagarde personally asked Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis to block Binance’s bid for a license to operate across the European Union, according to a Wall Street Journal report citing people familiar with the discussions. The intervention came after Greek regulators had all but signed off on the application, raising an obvious question about how much sway the ECB president can exert over a process she has no formal authority over. What Lagarde Reportedly Knew, and When She Acted Binance had applied through Greece’s Hellenic Capital Market Commission (HCMC) for a license under the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets framework, the kind of approval that, once granted by one country, covers the entire bloc. By early June, the application had cleared its technical review. The mandatory 40-day assessment period ended without objections, the HCMC’s anti-money laundering officer had signed off favorably, and notifications to other member states were reportedly already being prepared. Then, sometime between June 7 and June 15, that changed. An H...