S&P Global Ratings said euro-pegged stablecoins could scale from a niche €650 million ($767 million) market at year-end 2025 to as much as €1.1 trillion ($1.3 trillion) by 2030, a level equal to 4.2% of eurozone banks’ overnight deposits, according to an upper-bound scenario in a Tuesday report on European bank stablecoin activity. 

In its baseline case, S&P projects the market will reach €570 billion ($672 billion) by 2030, which would equate to 2.2% of total eurozone bank deposits. This forecast assumes that tokenized investments will provide €500 billion ($590 billion) in demand, while tokenized payments will contribute approximately €100 billion ($118 billion). 

Notably, the report notes a stark disparity compared to the U.S. market, where USD-pegged stablecoins held a combined value of $310 billion at the end of 2025. S&P estimates that tokenized real-world assets in the U.S. could comprise 1.2% of total RWAs by 2030, a metric the agency extrapolated to the €28 trillion eurozone RWA market to formulate its baseline digital settlement projections.

“We believe that real-world applications of stablecoins, compared to the current use for crypto asset trading, supports this very high growth multiple. Yet the potential market size is highly sensitive to variations in the forecast parameters. This results in a wide range of possible outcomes,” S&P analysts said in the report.

Global stablecoin issuance

The agency stated that euro-pegged stablecoins are “ready for adoption” and demand could follow, fueled by technological progress in blockchain scalability, institutional adoption of tokenized assets, and interoperability with emerging payment rails.

On issuance, S&P says banks and bank-affiliated entities will likely enter the market in 2026. A group of 11 European banks from nine countries plans a jointly issued euro stablecoin in the second half of 2026 through Netherlands-based Qivalis, which is seeking an electronic money institution license in the first half of 2026. The consortium’s network reaches about 150 million clients. 

Separately, the report said 10 global systemically important banks announced plans in October 2025 to issue G7-currency stablecoins on public blockchains, though timing and jurisdictions remain unspecified. Japan's three megabanks have also plan to launch yen-pegged stablecoins for wholesale corporate payments with public backing from Japan's Financial Services Agency.

MiCA framework anchors institutional stablecoin entry

S&P Global Ratings credits the EU’s Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCA) as the catalyst for institutional adoption. The regulation, which became effective for stablecoins on Jan. 1, 2025, stands out for its comprehensiveness, according to the report. It mandates strict rules for reserve asset eligibility, segregation, and redemption, alongside standardized disclosure and prudential requirements for issuers.

Despite the operational status of the framework, S&P noted that several critical technical details remain under finalization by the European Banking Authority (EBA). These include the exact composition of reserve assets, specifically the minimum share of instruments with maximum maturities and concentration limits for deposits at credit institutions. 

Additionally, policymakers are still defining technical standards for their own fund requirements, recovery plans, and specific stress-testing methodologies for stablecoin issuers. A full review of MiCA by the European Commission is scheduled for completion in June 2027.

Beyond Europe, S&P notes that stablecoin rules are already effective in jurisdictions including Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, and the United Arab Emirates, while frameworks in the U.S., UK, and South Korea remain in development or refinement. In the U.S., the GENIUS Act was signed into law in July 2025, providing a federal legal basis for stablecoin issuance.

Other institutions have published varying global forecasts. Citi analysts project the overall stablecoin market could reach $1.9 trillion by 2030 in a base case, or up to $4 trillion in a bullish scenario, while Standard Chartered estimates the market could grow to $2 trillion by 2028. In contrast, JPMorgan analysts reiterated a more conservative outlook, projecting a total market capitalization of $500 billion to $600 billion by 2028, citing competition from tokenized bank deposits and central bank digital currencies.