- The Senate votes on the cryptoassets bill on Thursday, May 21. Of the president’s fifteen amendments, one was included.
- Minister Bogucki from the Chancellery of the President announces Nawrocki’s third veto if the rest of the amendments are rejected.
- Full MiCA goes into effect on July 1. Polish CASP companies that fail to obtain a KNF license lose their right to operate.
- Even if the president signs it, the licensing procedure at the Polish Financial Supervision Authority will not be completed before the deadline.
It’s May 18th. There are 44 days left until the end of the MiCA transition period. At that time, the Polish Parliament had just passed the Act on the Crypto-Asset Market for the third time in seven months. It was vetoed twice by President Karol Nawrocki. Everything indicates that he will soon veto it for the third time, and the Polish crypto industry will enter July without a licensing path, without supervision and without legal possibility to act.
On Friday, May 15, the Sejm passed the bill by a vote of 241 to 200, with zero abstentions. Of the fifteen amendments submitted by the Chancellery of the President, the government majority accepted one: the obligation for the Polish Financial Supervision Authority to prepare an annual market report. The remaining fourteen were thrown into the trash. Minister Andrzej Domański explained before the vote that this bill was on the side of Poles, “and not on the side of fraudsters, bandits and fraudsters.” The comment towards PiS, which simultaneously submitted a proposal for a total ban on crypto trading with a penalty of up to 10 years in prison, was clear: “these are the Himalayas of hypocrisy.”
The first time, the second time, and the third time?
This week the bill goes to the Senate. The session begins on Wednesday, May 20, with voting scheduled for Thursday, May 21. In this morning’s column, Bogusław Chrabota quotes unofficial signals from the Senate and concludes that he will not introduce any substantive changes. Minister Zbigniew Bogucki from the Chancellery of the President has already officially announced that the rejection of the presidential amendments will be the basis for another veto.
The problem is that even if Nawrocki changed his mind at the last minute and signed the act, Polish companies would not make it. The licensing procedure at the Polish Financial Supervision Authority for crypto-asset service providers (CASP) takes months, not weeks. The first real license would be available in the fall at the earliest. And July 1, 2026 is the EU deadline, after which a company without a CASP license is not allowed to provide services in the EU.
This leads to a paradox that cannot be politically circumvented. After July 1, the Polish crypto market will be legally operated by exchanges and currency exchange offices with licenses obtained in Estonia, Lithuania, France or Germany, on the basis of an EU passport. Polish companies, previously operating under the local transitional regime, will be pushed to the margins overnight. Some will transfer their licensing abroad and return as an Estonian or Lithuanian entity. Some will just disappear. According to Rzeczpospolita, there are over 2 million Poles active on the crypto market, and the Zondacrypto case showed how much the lack of supervision costs.
What does this mean for crypto investors?
In my opinion, this is not a dispute about the details of the regulations, but about a political position. The president has a veto tool in his hand and consistently uses it as leverage in the dispute with Donald Tusk’s government. The government, in turn, has not been ready for months to really talk about compromise, preferring to repeat the same bill in the hope that one day it will pass. However, what is at stake in this game is not political reason, but the Polish industry, which will lose customers, capital and people to Estonia and Lithuania.
In practice, this means two things for the average investor. First of all, Polish crypto exchange offices and smaller exchanges may simply close their operations or suspend them from July, without a clear message when they will return. Secondly, it is better to withdraw funds on such platforms or transfer them to an EU-licensed exchange. The sooner the better, because there is a risk that at the end of June we may be dealing with the so-called a “bank run”, which leads to a company’s insolvency if too many people want to withdraw their deposits at the same time. zondacrypto taught us that the “transition period” is usually enough for everything except customer payouts.
Thursday will show what result the Senate will send the bill further. If indeed there are no amendments, Nawrocki’s veto will become a formality. And the counter, which as of the date of writing this article is 44 days, will continue to tick.
