In an exclusive interview with The Crypto Times, an OKX representative explained why the exchange selected Malta as its European regulatory base, how the removal of USDT affected liquidity and user behaviour, and while they are open to every opportunity a banking license in Europe is not their top priority.
The discussion also covered potential acquisitions in Europe, OKX’s regulated derivatives and payment products, its decision not to prioritise a banking licence, and the growing use of artificial intelligence across trading, custody and compliance operations.
While a large majority of crypto players choose Germany, Netherlands and other EU member states, why did OKX choose Malta as the preferred jurisdiction?
Malta wasn’t a choice driven by convenience. OKX held a VASP registration with the Malta Financial Services Authority from November 2021, four years before MiCA came into force. That relationship predates the regulatory race to get licensed.
The MFSA is a well-resourced regulator, over 500 staff, with decades of financial services expertise built on banking, payments, and funds regulation. Because financial services are central to Malta’s economy, the authority developed specialist expertise early and applied it rigorously. OKX’s license application was not a quick process. Many firms that initially came to Malta during the early ‘Blockchain Island’ years abandoned their applications once they saw what the MFSA actually required. The firms that stayed did so because they could meet the standard.
What Malta offers is direct engagement with senior supervisory staff, fast turnaround on regulatory questions, and a regulator that understood crypto early and built a framework accordingly. The talent base is deep, employment costs are competitive, and it sits in a well-connected hub for European operations.
How difficult was the MFSA licensing process in practice and what aspects of the regulatory review were most intensive?
By the time MiCA came into force, we were prepared as we took the matter seriously from the start. It involved a lot of intensive work over a period of years to ensure we were aligned with MiCA expectations. Also, four years of active supervision meant there were no material gaps to close when the transition came. The MFSA has been conducting audits, reviewing our AML/CFT programme, and engaging with our governance directly since 2021.
The areas that received the most scrutiny were MiCA readiness, governance and the fit-and-proper assessment of senior management; AML/CFT controls and the quality of transaction monitoring; customer asset segregation; operational resilience and the ability to handle disruption without affecting client funds and ICT frameworks.
What innovative products and developments do you plan to deliver for EU consumers specifically?
2026 has already been the year Europe moved from permission to product. We’re not talking about regulatory frameworks in the abstract anymore. We’re operating under them.
X-Perps launched this year as regulated crypto derivatives under MiFID II, the first time European traders have had access to powerful derivatives from a regulated venue backed by deep, institutional-grade liquidity. We’ve also brought OKX Earn, OKX Card, and stablecoin payments to European users under our Payment Institution licence.
The practical result is that most financial needs (paying, getting paid, building wealth) can now be met within the OKX ecosystem under EU regulatory frameworks. That’s a different proposition to what we had 18 months ago.
The next phase is deepening the product and improving the experience specifically for European users: more local rails, better local language support, increased local payment methods. The work isn’t finished.
What are the biggest misconceptions consumers have about MiCA licensing?
The most common one is that a MiCA licence is a box ticking exercise. That view underestimates what authorisation actually requires.
Obtaining MiCA authorisation means structural work: governance frameworks meeting fit-and-proper standards, legally enforceable customer asset protection, operational resilience, AML controls, and the legal infrastructure to make those things real rather than cosmetic. It also means ongoing supervision, audits, and a regulator with authority to intervene.
MICA’s stablecoin rules forced EU venues to restrict non-complaint tokens like USDT. How did OKX approach this transition for European users, and what impact did it have on liquidity and user behavior?
The restrictions were a structural requirement under MiCA’s EMT framework, and we treated them as such. Platforms operating in Europe can only offer stablecoins that are regulated under MiCA. USDT isn’t, so we removed it from our European exchange ahead of the deadline.
The honest answer on liquidity is that it had an effect. USDT has been the dominant trading pair for crypto-native traders globally for years. Moving to compliant alternatives changes habits. We’ve seen users adapt to USDC and other MiCA-compliant stablecoins, but the transition takes time.
The longer-term picture is that MiCA’s stablecoin framework creates conditions for EUR-denominated and compliant USD stablecoins to grow significantly across European markets.
Can you give us an overview of the external costs involved in securing a MiCA license, including legal advisors, the Big Four auditor, and AML/compliance consultants.
We don’t publish specific cost figures. What I can say is that they’re material, and it’s one of the reasons that 80% of exchanges won’t survive the MiCA transition. In order to operate in EU as a meaningful crypto exchange, its not only MICA. You would also need a PI or EMI license in order to process stablecoins. If then you want to offer meaningful trading products to your users, with derivatives, or leverage, you would also need to apply for a MIFID license. Next to those essential financial licences, there is also compliance with DORA, GDPR, DAC8, and so on to consider. The regulatory costs to operate as a regulated service provider are heavy.
MiCA authorisation itself is not a document-filing exercise. It requires external legal counsel with regulatory expertise in the relevant member state; an auditor capable of certifying financial controls; compliance experts to build and validate your transaction monitoring programme; and specialist technology infrastructure for operational resilience and custody.
For OKX, having built this technological and compliance infrastructure over multiple years, these costs are baked into our operating model. For firms approaching this for the first time, the costs can run into millions.
OKX estimates that only around 200 of Europe’s 1,100-1,300 crypto service providers have secured MiCA licenses. Is OKX considering acquiring European players?
Consolidation is an expected structural outcome of MiCA. We said early on that around 80% of exchanges would not survive the transition. That creates a very different competitive landscape.
We’ve seen evidence already: more than 240 crypto businesses ceased operations in Lithuania alone at the end of 2025 when their transition period ended. Smaller licensed players who can’t compete at scale are asking themselves whether to operate independently or find a partner with the infrastructure to support or acquire them.
OKX’s position is clear: we’re interested in anything that builds our European business and adds value to our users. Businesses with local user bases or a specific capability we don’t yet have is worth evaluating. We’d assess acquisitions on strategic merits, not as a means of accumulating licences. We already have MiCA, MiFID II and Payment Institution licences in Europe.
What percentage of significant user migration are you expecting after July 1?
I won’t give a precise percentage. What the data tells us is that 60% of European crypto users are currently on platforms without MiCA authorisation. The capital that redistributes from that is likely to be significant.
The timing and scale of migration could depend substantially on enforcement. If regulators take serious action (app store removals, cease-and-desist orders, coordinated action by national competent authorities), migration happens faster. If enforcement is slow, some of that capital stays offshore for longer.
What I can say is that we’ve built for it. We have the liquidity, the regulated product suite, and the operational capacity to absorb a meaningful share of that migration. We’re also offering an 8% deposit bonus for European users moving to OKX Europe from exchanges that do not have a MiCA license.
OKX already has MiCA, MiFID II and Payment Institution licenses in Europe. What is the next regulatory license OKX wants in Europe: EMI, banking, or something else?
For now, we have the licenses that we need to offer a fully regulated suite of crypto products in Europe. While I would never rule out exploring other ways for us to expand our product offering, it’s not something that we are actively prioritising.
Since your data shows nearly half of European card spend goes to food and groceries, are you actively moving away from targeting just the “crypto trader” demographic?
I firmly believe that crypto will become increasingly embedded across the entire financial sector, to a point where the distinction between a crypto trader and a trader is simply how their portfolio is structured, and crypto will be part of the financial lives of everyone. That’s not to say that everyone is going to sign up to crypto exchanges and start actively trading, but the fundamental architecture of the financial system will rely on crypto systems.
We are building the infrastructure to meet everyone’s fundamental financial needs, whether they are currently using crypto or not.
Is OKX planning to incorporate AI into its products and operations?
Absolutely, and we already have. This year we launched OnchainOS, an AI toolkit and operating-system layer for autonomous agents; OKX AI, a marketplace where AI agents discover work, transact and build an onchain reputation; Agent Trade Kit, an open-source toolkit giving developers more than 80 tools to let AI agents collect market data, place trades and manage portfolios; and OKX Agentic Wallet, purpose-built for AI agents with keys secured in a Trusted Execution Environment across nearly 20 chains.
It’s not just customer-facing either. AI plays an important role in how we protect the platform: AI-driven monitoring engines and in-house surveillance systems give us round-the-clock transaction monitoring and market surveillance, working alongside a compliance and financial-crime team of hundreds of specialists. AI isn’t a side project for us. It’s becoming core infrastructure across trading, custody and compliance.
