CRD6: A New Step Toward Capital Controls?

We had overlooked this information, but it’s important to revisit it — both for what it means in practical terms and for what it represents.

Directive 2024/1619, known as “CRD6,” took effect in France last April, as well as in all European Union member states. The text, which is not very clear even when summarized, had attracted little attention. Its consequences, however, are significant: the European Union is requiring banks located outside the EU to stop providing certain banking services directly to European residents, unless they have or open an authorized branch within the Union (1). This provision will take effect on January 11, 2027.

Several influencers — such as Pavol Lubtak on X or Aldo Sterone on YouTube — are concerned about this, as they see it as a restriction on our freedoms and a further step toward capital controls. We would no longer be entirely free to deposit our money wherever we choose: access to certain services offered by foreign banks would be limited to institutions with an authorized presence in the EU and subject to regulatory oversight.

Already, European customers of foreign banks with no representation in the EU are being asked to close their accounts. Given the severity of the fines involved — which are often calculated as a percentage of revenue — the institutions in question prefer not to take any risks. In practice, the message to foreign banks is clear: do not provide certain banking services directly to European customers without an authorized presence in the EU. This situation is reminiscent, in some respects, of the difficulties faced by U.S. citizens in opening or maintaining an account abroad, as U.S. extraterritorial law is restrictive enough to discourage any foreign bank from serving these customers. Europeans may now face similar obstacles.

Europeans who remain tax residents of the European Union but work part of the year in one or more third countries — where they have opened bank accounts — may thus find their financial transactions hindered. But this seems to be of little concern to Brussels.

A growing share of Europeans’ savings will remain within the EU’s financial system and, under all the regulations regarding financial transparency, under the watchful eye of the authorities. This development increasingly resembles a form of capital controls, without officially being called that.

What is the underlying objective? Governments and Brussels have their eyes on Europeans’ savings — approximately 35 trillion euros — to plug their budget deficits, finance the energy transition and rearmament, aid Ukraine, and so on. There is no shortage of reasons! The first step could therefore be to keep more of these savings within Europe and limit their outflow. Next, more restrictive measures could be put in place to channel this windfall — which politicians tell us is “underutilized” — toward public programs. It would then become much more difficult to evade such restrictions.

All of this is troubling. What can we do? Remember that it’s possible to achieve a form of “internal secession” through gold and bitcoin, by legally moving a portion of one’s savings out of the banking system and away from the euro. Rather than simply moving your money to a foreign bank account, you invest in an asset that lies outside the direct control of governments and the Brussels bureaucracy. Beyond their potential for appreciation, this is a crucial advantage to keep in mind.

(1) In principle, an exception applies when a European customer approaches a foreign bank on his or her own initiative (reverse solicitation). However, it is up to the bank to prove that the customer was not solicited and that the relationship was indeed initiated exclusively by the customer. This evidence is difficult enough to provide that, in practice, it deters certain foreign institutions from accepting European customers.