Payment and Crypto Services 

The law on payment and crypto services has a common denominator: it concerns services in connection with money or money-like instruments. However, the regulatory complexes differ considerably in some respects. The execution of money transactions is essentially subject to the regulations of the Payment Services Supervision Act (Zahlungsdiensteaufsichtsgesetz, ZAG) and the Payment Services Directive (Payment Services Directive, PSD), while the issue and provision of crypto asset services is subject to the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation (MiCAR). The two areas of law overlap not only in terms of e-money tokens, which are considered e-money and therefore also money in the sense of German payment law. Crypto-asset services are also generally associated with money transactions, as crypto-assets acquired on the primary or secondary market also have to be paid for.

Crypto asset law has taken a huge leap forward at European level since MiCAR came into force in Dec. 2024. Service providers are hoping for advantages, particularly in the cross-border provision of services. Until then, European crypto law was essentially characterised by a registration requirement under the European Anti-Money Laundering Directive (AMLD), which was interpreted differently by the EU/EEA states and sometimes entailed considerable barriers to market entry.

In recent years, payment services law has been heavily influenced by a large number of civil court rulings concerning, for example, the scope of restrictions on the execution of payment orders induced by anti-money laundering or sanction law or the scope of payment service providers' liability for unauthorised payment transactions. From a regulatory perspective, significant changes to payment services law are expected to take effect in 2026, albeit with less momentum than in crypto law, but not with less relevance, when the new Payment Services Regulation (PSR) and the third Payment Services Directive (PSD 3) come into force.