The European Crypto Initiative (EUCI) – a European crypto advocacy organisation based in Brussels – has received financial support from important industry members. This support marks the growing focus of the crypto industry on the upcoming EU-wide regulations that will affect many aspects of its work.
The EUCI received a grant from the Ethereum Foundation – the non-profit focused on supporting the Ethereum blockchain, the Interchain foundation supporting the Cosmos blockchain and Maker DAO – the protocol behind the stablecoin DAI.
A Maker DAO representative expressed the following about the grant: “We have finally found an advocacy partner who fully represents our values and interests. If you care about the European market, support the EUCI.”
Marina Markezic (Executive director, EUCI) shared: “We are thrilled to be an Ethereum Foundation grantee and be supported by other core infrastructure projects like the Interchain Foundation and Maker DAO. We have demonstrated that our work is valuable for some of the most critical projects in the crypto industry.”
Simon Polrot (President, EUCI): “Receiving the grant will allow us to grow as an organisation and be even more effective in our educational efforts. We also grow our supporters’ list, so expect more announcements soon.”
The support for the crypto lobbyist comes amidst a very intense crypto-regulation season in the European institutions. At the end of June, two critical regulations for the industry were finalised on a political level – the Markets in Crypto Assets Regulation (MiCA) and the Transfer of Funds Regulation (TFR).
According to Florian Glatz (Vice-president, EUCI), the adoption of both regulations creates an entirely new playing field – “one that the crypto industry simply cannot afford to ignore”.
“I believe that the support we have received from these important industry players has shown that the crypto industry is increasingly more interested in a dialogue with regulators – and we are here to facilitate this dialogue,” Marina Markezic added.
The European Crypto Initiative (EUCI) is an EU-based organisation that aims to shape EU regulation to favour open, permissionless, decentralised applications leveraging blockchain technology.