The offeror
The person making the offer to the public of the crypto-asset must draw up the whitepaper (Art. 4(1)). Legal-person offerors must generally be established as a legal entity and act honestly, fairly and professionally.
MiCA whitepaper guide
MiCA crypto-asset whitepapers: the complete guide
MiCA (Regulation (EU) 2023/1114) is the EU's harmonised regime for crypto-assets. For an 'other' crypto-asset — a utility, governance, platform or project token that is neither an asset-referenced token (ART) nor an e-money token (EMT) — an offer to the public or an admission to trading triggers a mandatory whitepaper under Title II, unless an Article 4 exemption applies. The whitepaper is not pre-approved by any authority: the issuer notifies the home Member State's competent authority at least 20 working days before publication (Art. 8), publishes, and remains strictly liable for the content under Article 15. Since 23 December 2025 the whitepaper must be filed as a single Inline XBRL (iXBRL) XHTML document tagged against the ESMA MiCA taxonomy (ITS (EU) 2024/2984). This guide walks each piece, with every claim tied to an Article.
Content reflecting MiCA and its Level-2 acts as in force in mid-2026.
Last reviewed: 6 July 2026
Every legal claim on this page is traced to a specific Article of Regulation (EU) 2023/1114 or its implementing acts, cross-checked against our internal legal knowledge base. This is educational software, not legal advice, and it does not create a client relationship. Under Article 15 MiCA the issuer, not any tool, is liable for the content of a whitepaper.
What MiCA is
MiCA — the Markets in Crypto-Assets Regulation, Regulation (EU) 2023/1114 — is a single EU rulebook for crypto-assets that are not already financial instruments. It regulates issuance and offers of crypto-assets and the crypto-asset service providers (CASPs) that trade, custody and place them. A crypto-asset is 'a digital representation of a value or of a right that is able to be transferred and stored electronically using distributed ledger technology or similar technology' (Art. 3(1)(5)).
MiCA applied in two waves under Article 149: the stablecoin titles (ARTs and EMTs) from 30 June 2024, and everything else — including the 'other' crypto-asset whitepaper regime — from 30 December 2024. The transitional runway for firms already providing crypto-asset services under national law ended on 1 July 2026 (Art. 143(3)); from that date, serving EU clients without MiCA authorisation is a breach of EU law.
This guide covers the wedge most token projects care about: the Title II whitepaper for an 'other' crypto-asset. It does not cover ART or EMT issuance or CASP authorisation, which sit under Titles III, IV and V and carry far heavier authorisation regimes.
Who must file a whitepaper
For an 'other' crypto-asset, the whitepaper duty attaches to one of three actors, in priority order (Art. 4). Whoever the drafter is, the content rules of Article 6 and Annex I are the same.
The person seeking admission to trading
Where a person requests admission of the crypto-asset to a trading platform, that person bears the whitepaper duty (Art. 4(1)).
The operator of the trading platform
Where a crypto-asset is admitted to trading and no offeror or admission-seeker drew up a whitepaper, the platform operator must — though it may be relieved by a written agreement with the admission-seeker to do so (Art. 4 with Art. 5).
Token taxonomy: ART, EMT, 'other' — and out of scope
Every in-scope crypto-asset falls into exactly one of three MiCA buckets, and the bucket determines the regime (Art. 3). The Witness / Tokenpaper wedge is the third bucket — 'other' — which carries the lightest regime: notify and publish a whitepaper, no pre-approval, no ongoing token-issuer authorisation.
| Bucket | Definition | Regime | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|---|
| ART — asset-referenced token | Purports to keep a stable value by referencing another value or right, or a combination, including one or more official currencies. | Title III — issuer authorisation, approved whitepaper, reserve and own-funds rules. | Art. 3(1)(6) |
| EMT — e-money token | Purports to keep a stable value by referencing the value of one official currency. | Title IV — issuer must be a credit institution or EMI, plus a whitepaper. | Art. 3(1)(7) |
| 'Other' crypto-asset | Any crypto-asset that is neither an ART nor an EMT — utility, governance, platform-native and most fungible project tokens. | Title II — whitepaper: draft, notify, publish. No pre-approval. (iXBRL format code OTHR.) | Title II (Art. 4-15) |
Some things are outside MiCA entirely (Art. 2): financial instruments and security tokens are governed by MiFID II and the prospectus regime, not by a MiCA whitepaper — the ESMA Guidelines on the qualification of crypto-assets as financial instruments (December 2024) draw the line (Art. 2(4)); genuinely unique, non-fungible crypto-assets are excluded (Art. 2(3)), though a large fungible series or a fractionalised NFT can fall back in scope; and fully decentralised arrangements with no identifiable issuer sit outside the current perimeter (Recital 22) and are under active 2026 review. Mis-classifying a security token as an 'other' crypto-asset is the most dangerous mistake — it can miss a prospectus obligation. This guide and the tools flag those boundaries and route them out.
The whitepaper: draft, notify, publish
MiCA deliberately built a light-touch, no-pre-approval regime for 'other' crypto-assets. There is no gatekeeper clearance step — which is exactly why a self-service tool is viable.
The content is fixed by Article 6, structured across the Annex I Parts A to I, and wrapped by the mandatory statements in Article 6(3) to (7) plus the environmental disclosure in Article 6(1)(j). See the whitepaper requirements page for the field-by-field breakdown.
- 1
Draft against Article 6 and Annex I
Assemble every mandatory disclosure — offeror, issuer (if different), the project, the offer, the crypto-asset, the rights, the technology, the risks — fair, clear and not misleading, with no material omissions (Art. 6(2)).
- 2
Notify the competent authority
Notify the whitepaper (and marketing communications) to the home Member State's competent authority at least 20 working days before publication (Art. 8). The authority does not approve it.
- 3
Publish and keep accessible
Publish the whitepaper on your website before the offer or admission starts, and keep it accessible while the crypto-assets are held by the public (Art. 9). Marketing must be consistent with it and not published before it (Art. 7).
MiCA timeline for 'other' crypto-assets
The dates that bind an 'other' crypto-asset whitepaper. The whole regime has been live since 30 December 2024, and the machine-readable filing format has been mandatory since 23 December 2025.
| Date | What applies | Legal basis |
|---|---|---|
| 30 December 2024 | The Title II whitepaper regime for 'other' crypto-assets (Art. 4-15, Annex I) applies, together with the CASP framework and market-abuse rules. | Art. 149 |
| 23 December 2025 | The Inline XBRL / XHTML whitepaper format becomes mandatory. From this date a MiCA whitepaper is not a PDF but a single tagged XHTML document. | ITS (EU) 2024/2984 |
| 1 July 2026 | The Article 143(3) transitional period for CASPs already operating under national law ends — the EU/EEA outer boundary, which no Member State may extend. | Art. 143(3) |
'Not approved' does not mean 'not regulated'
No competent authority approves an 'other' crypto-asset whitepaper before publication (Art. 8). That is the friction MiCA removed, and it is what makes self-service filing possible. But the absence of approval is not the absence of supervision: the authority can require amendments, suspend or prohibit an offer where MiCA is breached.
And the issuer is strictly liable. Article 15 makes the offeror, person seeking admission or platform operator civilly liable for information in the whitepaper that is not complete, fair or clear, or that is misleading — and that liability cannot be excluded or limited by contract. A tool can make the disclosure complete and correct; it never assumes the liability.
Tools for MiCA whitepaper filing
Witness builds two MiCA surfaces. The free whitepaper check tells you whether your offer triggers the Title II obligation, is exempt under Article 4, or falls under a different regime. Tokenpaper is the paid engine that turns a qualifying offer into a filing-ready whitepaper — guided Annex I intake and validated Inline XBRL against the ESMA taxonomy. Every field cites its article; it is software, not legal advice.
Deep dives
- Whitepaper requirementsArticle 6, the Annex I Parts, the mandatory statements, and the 20-working-day notify-not-approve process.
- Article 4 exemptionsWhen an offer is exempt from the whitepaper — the offer-size, audience and nature-of-asset limbs, with the traps.
- iXBRL filingWhat Inline XBRL is, the ESMA MiCA taxonomy, the LEI requirement, and the common validation-failure classes.
Frequently asked questions
What is a MiCA whitepaper?
A crypto-asset whitepaper is the mandatory disclosure document for a public offer or an admission to trading of an 'other' crypto-asset under MiCA Title II (Regulation (EU) 2023/1114). Its content is set by Article 6 and Annex I. Unlike a securities prospectus it is not pre-approved by any authority, but the issuer is strictly liable for its content under Article 15.
Who has to file a MiCA whitepaper?
For an 'other' crypto-asset, the offeror making the public offer, or the person seeking admission to trading, must draw up and file the whitepaper (Art. 4(1)). If a crypto-asset is admitted to trading and neither did, the trading-platform operator must, unless a written agreement shifts that duty (Art. 4 with Art. 5).
Is a MiCA whitepaper approved before publication?
No. For 'other' crypto-assets there is no pre-approval. You notify the home Member State's competent authority at least 20 working days before publication (Art. 8) and then publish. The authority does not clear the document, but it retains power to require amendments, suspend or prohibit the offer, and the issuer remains strictly liable under Article 15.
Does a MiCA whitepaper have to be in iXBRL?
Yes, since 23 December 2025. ITS (EU) 2024/2984 requires the whitepaper to be a single Inline XBRL (iXBRL) XHTML document tagged against the ESMA MiCA taxonomy. A PDF-only submission no longer meets the format requirement.
What is an 'other' crypto-asset under MiCA?
An 'other' crypto-asset is any crypto-asset that is neither an asset-referenced token (ART, Art. 3(1)(6)) nor an e-money token (EMT, Art. 3(1)(7)) — in practice utility, governance, platform-native and most fungible project tokens. It falls under the lighter Title II whitepaper regime. Financial instruments (MiFID II) and genuinely unique NFTs (Art. 2(3)) are outside MiCA entirely.