Bitcoin, Fiat & Rock'n'Roll Why 9 European Banks Are Launching Their Own Stablecoin
In this episode of BFRR – Bitcoin, Fiat & Rock ’n’ Roll, host Jonas Groß welcomes Floris Lugt and Jan Lebbe, Co-Heads Digital Assets at ING Wholesale Banking and representatives of a new euro stablecoin initiative formed by nine major European banks.
The conversation traces ING’s blockchain journey from 2016 experimentation to today’s focused digital asset strategy. Floris explains how early work in trade finance, collateral and payments consortia revealed a clear gap: while assets are moving on-chain, a trusted, interoperable euro cash leg is still missing. That realization, combined with rising client demand, led to the idea of a joint bank-issued stablecoin, rather than each bank building its own siloed solution.
Jonas, Floris and Jan discuss why, despite the crowded market, they believe there is room—and a need—for another euro stablecoin: not as a speculative asset, but as regulated payment infrastructure backed by established banks, their compliance frameworks and massive client networks. They outline their vision of a neutral e-money institution based in the Netherlands, supervised by the Dutch central bank, focused solely on issuing the stablecoin, while banks and regulated providers build client-facing products and use cases on top.
Use cases range from crypto trading and DeFi liquidity to cross-border payments, treasury, settlement of tokenized securities and real-world assets, and programmable payments. The trio also explore the coexistence of stablecoins, tokenized deposits and CBDCs, and the ongoing debate between permissioned and permissionless blockchains, including the role of privacy and zero-knowledge technology.
Looking ahead to 2030, Floris and Jan expect stablecoins to be a mainstream yet almost invisible layer of financial infrastructure—quietly enabling new forms of value transfer while existing payment rails like SEPA continue to thrive alongside them.
Press release on the joint stablecoin project
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