MiCA hiring in practice: how we helped build compliant teams in the Baltics

Why MiCA changed how crypto companies build teams

For years, crypto companies operated in an environment where governance and compliance were lighter, more flexible, and often handled by small internal teams or external partners. This was not a flaw; it was simply how the industry worked at the time.

Before MiCA, Europe was a leading region for VASP registrations. According to CoinClub Research in 2024, there were 2747 registrations in Europe, and Poland alone registered over 1400 DASPs. At that time, Europe’s regulatory environment remained favorable.

MiCA changed this very quickly.

For example, in 2026 Poland, which was the leading state providing VASP registrations just two years ago, remains in an uncertain situation because the country has not adopted a final national act implementing MiCA. On 1 December 2025, this act was vetoed by the President of Poland. As Magdalena Mamzer, Lawyer at KHG, mentioned during the UN:BLOCK panel “EU Crypto Compliance in Practice” discussion:

“Now we have just below 2000 companies under the VASP registration, and we are expecting that more than half of them will vanish after implementing MiCA.”

And that’s how MiCA works. Many crypto companies are simply not prepared. Suddenly, they are expected to operate with governance structures similar to traditional financial institutions, while hiring from a talent pool that has not grown at the same pace. Many of the roles MiCA now requires were nonexistent in crypto just a few years ago and are still very challenging to find.

MiCA demands companies to have:

• risk officers with measurable track records,
• executive and supervisory boards composed of highly qualified, reliable professionals who can provide real, effective oversight, not simply hold a formal board position,
• local MLROs in the jurisdiction where the license is obtained,
• compliance leaders who know how to structure effective lines of defense and build well-designed internal controls,
• ITSEC professionals who understand DORA and are able to ensure effective IT risk controls in a crypto environment.

And the problem is not that these people don’t exist. They do. But across Europe, every CASP is chasing the same dozen profiles, watching the same tiny talent market.

On top of that, regulators expect local presence. Board members and key control functions often need to be based in the country where the license is obtained. That means you cannot hire a brilliant MLRO from Germany to support a CASP license in Latvia.

Now in the Baltic countries, only a few companies have already reached the MiCA licence stage:

1. BlockBen (Latvia). Received its MiCA licence at the end of 2025, becoming one of the first crypto companies authorised under the new regulatory framework in Latvia.
2. Nexdesk (Latvia). Obtained its licence shortly after BlockBen, also at the end of 2025. The company was approved to provide regulated crypto-asset services under MiCA.
3. CoinGate (Lithuania). A crypto payment provider that received its MiCA licence in Lithuania towards the end of 2025, allowing it to continue operating across the EU under the new regulatory regime.
4. Robinhood (Lithuania). Robinhood’s European entity received a MiCA licence from the Bank of Lithuania in mid-2025, marking one of the first cases of a large international player entering the EU crypto market under MiCA.
   
   

According to publicly available information, before MiCA there were more than 1000 companies in the Baltic region with VASP registrations. Some of them have taken the first formal steps toward a MiCA licence and are preparing for the full review process.

At first sight, everything looks manageable. In practice, things become difficult.

It’s not only about the regulator. Yes, there are strict criteria that must be followed to obtain a licence, and companies can get the checklists from regulators or law firms. It’s not only about supervision fees and capital costs either, even though MiCA sets minimum fees and they vary significantly. It’s not even just about the time required to prepare, although that alone can take months.

It’s also about the people you need, and that’s often the hardest part.

There are very few board-level professionals in crypto who have relevant experience and can go through a MiCA licensing process. Most crypto executives built products, raised capital, and scaled communities, but they did not sit on regulated financial boards, deal with supervisory interviews, or pass fit-and-proper assessments.

Regulators, however, are not looking for “crypto-native” reputations. They expect experience in regulated financial services, clear accountability structures, documented risk oversight, AML/CFT expertise, and the ability to demonstrate real control over the organisation. And these professionals do exist, but their numbers in crypto are limited, rather in traditional finance.

“Many of the skills MiCA now requires, such as governance, risk management, internal controls, and regulatory oversight, already exist in traditional financial institutions,” shares Anna Hroza, Evotym partner.

You need people on board who understand what they are doing, how they are doing it, and who can build internal processes exactly the way regulators expect them to be built. In practice, that means you need people who can actually speak with regulators in their language.

As Jakub Weiclaw, Chairman of the Board at Magnetiq Bank, shared during the UN:BLOCK panel “EU Crypto Compliance in Practice”:

“We are a small company, but we have seven employees who are responsible for communication with our regulator, the Latvian Bank.”

This is where many companies slow down. For many teams, this becomes the real bottleneck – not regulation itself, but the ability to build a strong, compliant team fast enough to keep up with licensing timelines.

How we found candidates for key MiCA roles in the Baltics in three weeks

At Evotym, we recently worked with a couple of crypto companies preparing for MiCA licensing in the Baltic region.

The request was straightforward: build compliant boards in two different jurisdictions so the companies could proceed with licensing. For one country, the focus was on building a supervisory board with non-executive directors responsible for oversight. For another, the structure required executive board members with supervisory responsibilities.

Our approach was divided intentionally into 2 phases:

Phase 1. Market mapping

• Broad LinkedIn research to understand the real size of the MiCA-ready talent pool
• Alignment with legal requirements for supervisory and executive boards
• Identification of profiles that regulators typically approve

Phase 2. Target outreach

• Narrowed search to well-known figures on the market with clean track records
• Focus on specific expertise: AML, compliance, IT security, finance, strategy
• Highly personalized outreach, tailored to each candidate’s profile

Such an approach minimized noise and respected candidates’ time and professional reputation.

The main challenge

One of the key challenges was engaging qualified candidates while the companies were still in the licensing process.

When a license is not yet secured, hiring for regulated roles becomes more complex and fragile. Uncertainty around timelines and post-licensing structure affects how senior specialists evaluate opportunities and slows down final decisions.

Formally, for submitting a MiCA application, it is enough to agree on candidate profiles who confirm they are ready to start once the licence is granted. But in practice, the question remains: how many senior professionals are willing to commit to a role that technically does not exist yet? For board-level and key control functions, this is rarely a simple yes.

Another major challenge was identifying candidates without conflicts of interest. Many MiCA-ready directors are already involved in other regulated projects, act as founders, C-level executives, or board members in parallel companies. As a result, a large part of strong profiles is filtered out during legal and compliance checks.

This complexity is amplified in small, highly interconnected markets like Baltics, where professional circles are tight and candidates tend to be especially cautious about the roles they take on, knowing that their professional reputation is one of their most valuable assets.

Result

In this case, expectations were discussed early, starting with a clear understanding of which roles were actually required under MiCA, why each of them existed, and what level of responsibility they carried during the licensing phase and beyond. This helped align the hiring process with the regulatory structure, rather than treating roles as formal placeholders. An approach like this is needed for every company that wants to obtain a licence. Without a clear understanding of who you need, hiring delays become a standard situation.

As a result, we found five board-level candidates across Estonia and Lithuania in three weeks. This allowed the companies to continue their MiCA preparation without postponing licensing due to unfilled roles, in a region where only three companies have reached this stage so far.

What actually helps when hiring under MiCA

What we see working in practice is a change in mindset.

Companies that manage to move forward under MiCA usually stop treating hiring as a separate operational task and start treating it as part of the regulatory setup itself. They define roles early, understand which responsibilities cannot be combined, and adjust expectations to the reality of the market.

From the recruitment side, this often means looking beyond “pure crypto” profiles and focusing on people with experience in regulated environments who can realistically operate under MiCA requirements.

This approach does not eliminate the shortage, but it makes the process more predictable and reduces the risk of last-minute delays.

What does this mean for your company

If you are preparing for MiCA licensing, it is important to factor hiring timelines into your overall plan. One of the most common mistakes we see is underestimating how much time and effort it takes to close key regulatory roles.

If your team is still figuring out how to structure roles and responsibilities under MiCA, we have put together a practical guide that may help. It covers how to structure a crypto company the right way and move toward CASP licensing with confidence.

Ready to discuss your MiCA hiring setup?

At Evotym, we work with MiCA-related roles on a daily basis and know how to close critical positions within three to four weeks, even in small and competitive markets.

If you are already in the licensing process or planning to start, it may be worth discussing your hiring strategy before open roles begin to slow everything else down.

Send us a message, and our team will get back to you shortly.