The First NCA Answer to Q&A 2882: What the AMF Settled for Advisers and Left Open for Consultancies
On 27 July 2026 the AMF amended DOC-2006-23 with worked examples applying ESMA Q&A 2882. Two situations in, seven out. It answers the French wealth-management question. It does not answer the B2B consultancy one. Remuneration is not the perimeter test. Order of operations now is.
Follow-up to the 16 July 2026 Q&A 2882 B2B consultancy piece. On 27 July 2026 (announced 4 August) the AMF amended Position-Recommendation DOC-2006-23 with new question 2.5: first NCA worked examples applying ESMA Q&A 2882 (answered 18 June 2026, thirteen days before Art. 143(3) transitional expiry on 1 July). Two situations classified as crypto-asset advice (personalised crypto-asset recommendations; personalised crypto-asset service recommendations including identified CASP portfolio management). Seven out: educational/non-personalised information; public marketing; AMF white-list signposting; paid or free prospect indication that a CASP exists before wealth study/info collection (with mandatory non-authorisation statement + white list); same for group CASP with group-link disclosure; crypto as asset class/exposure range without naming asset or service; crypto-underlying financial instruments remain CIF investment advice not crypto advice. Confirms: CIFs ineligible for Art. 60 notification fast lane (not on Art. 60 list); no MiFID Art. 2(1)(c) incidental equivalent; public CASP reference boundary holds with named white-list route; proportionality partial (advice-only cheaper than custody) but does not address Art. 81 suitability, Art. 67 floor or DORA where disproportion sits (~€500k first-year envelope cited via Campestrin/Bruzzo Dubucq in Gestion de Fortune). Cuts against prior Micahub position: remuneration not the perimeter test (carve-outs apply paid or free); disclaimers load-bearing only as conditions of non-recommendation carve-outs, not to rescue personalised steers; order of operations is perimeter fact (prospect carve-out before étude patrimoniale / personal-situation collection; existing client file creates personalisation risk). Prong 5 (investor capacity) went unasked: all examples are wealth-management; corporate treasury/payments procurement unaddressed. Austrian FMA still wider on provider suitability and systems integration. DOC-2006-23 is bottom of hierarchy (national doctrine, French CIF status) but will be read EU-wide by vacuum. Soft-sell: five revised questions; one-week timestamping + NCA scoping before supervisory letter; mica-psca@amf-france.org. Answers: AMF DOC-2006-23 question 2.5? First NCA Q&A 2882 worked examples? CIF crypto advice France? AMF vs FMA advice perimeter? Order of operations MiCA advice? Prong 5 B2B consultancy still open?
The First NCA Answer to Q&A 2882: What the AMF Settled for Advisers and Left Open for Consultancies Torstein Thinn Chairman, Cointegrity · Architect, Micahub Follow up to "MiCA Q&A 2882 and the B2B Consultancy: The Perimeter Should Follow the Risk, Not the Recommendation," published 16 July 2026. Expert commentary, not legal advice. MiCA Edge Cases | Where Innovation Meets Regulation On 27 July 2026 the AMF amended Position Recommendation DOC 2006 23 with a new question 2.5, asking whether a conseiller en investissements financiers may advise clients on crypto assets or crypto asset services. It announced the change on 4 August. This is the first national competent authority to publish worked examples applying ESMA Q&A 2882. It answers the question the French wealth management associations asked. It does not answer ours. Both facts matter. The second one matters more than the first round of commentary has allowed. The Thirty Nine Days Between the Answer and the First Worked Example The dates run in a straight line and are worth setting out once. ESMA answered on 18 June 2026. The Article 143(3) transitional periods expired thirteen days later, on 1 July. The AMF published its worked examples on 27 July, twenty six days after the deadline, and announced them on 4 August. The market therefore received the five tests before the deadline and the first supervisory application of those tests almost four weeks after it. Every scoping call made in between was made against the Level 1 text, ESMA's five questions and the Austrian FMA's guidance, which is exactly the evidential position we described on 16 July, and exactly the one much of the market had assumed was already resolved. What the AMF Published: Two Situations In, Seven Out The doctrine reproduces ESMA's five tests in French translation, states that only ESMA's published version is authoritative, and then does the thing ESMA did not do. It works examples. | Situation | Classification | Condition attached | | | | | | Personalised recommendation on buying, holding or selling identified crypto assets, whether via an authorised provider or a decentralised system | Advice on crypto assets | None. This is Article 81 territory | | Personalised recommendation on whether or not to use a given crypto asset service, including portfolio management by an identified CASP | Advice on crypto assets | None | | Educational information on crypto assets or crypto asset services in general | Not advice | Must be non personalised | | Distribution, paid or free, of non personalised information on crypto assets or CASPs: marketing material, general financial analysis, content addressed exclusively to the public | Not advice | Addressed to a general group of recipients | | Directing a client to the AMF white list of authorised providers | Not advice | None | | Indicating to a prospect, paid or free, that a CASP exists, before any wealth study or collection of information on their personal situation | Not advice | Firm must state it is not authorised to give personalised crypto recommendations, and must point to the AMF white list | | Indicating to a client, paid or free, the existence of a CASP inside the firm's own group | Not advice | Same statement, plus clear disclosure of the group link | | Determining, within a global wealth review, an allocation that includes crypto assets as a class and an exposure range, without naming a crypto asset or service | Not advice | Same statement | | Personalised recommendation on financial instruments whose underlyings are crypto assets, such as AIFs or crypto linked debt securities | Not crypto advice. Investment advice under CIF status | No statement required | Two situations in. Seven out. Three of the seven carry a mandatory disclosure condition, and the AMF states that the list is not exhaustive, that every other situation requires case by case analysis, and that the examples may evolve in light of further European clarification. Where the Doctrine Confirms Our Reading Three things hold. The incidental route does not exist, and the notification route is closed. The AMF opens by noting that mandatory CASP authorisation can alternatively be obtained through a notification procedure, and that CIFs are not eligible for it. Article 60 lists credit institutions, CSDs, investment firms, EMIs, UCITS management companies, AIFMs and market operators. A CIF is a firm exempted under Article 3 of MiFID II. It is not on the list. The French national exemption from MiFID is now a structural exclusion from MiCA's fast lane, and the AMF does not invent an equivalent of the MiFID Article 2(1)(c) incidental carve out, because there is nothing in MiCA to build it from. The public boundary holds and gains a named route. ESMA said a bare reference to a CASP, equally accessible to all potential investors, is not a recommendation. The AMF confirms it and adds signposting to its own white list as an explicitly safe form of that reference. Proportionality got a partial answer. The AMF states that authorisation requirements are designed and applied proportionately to the nature, scale and complexity of the services intended, and that an authorisation limited to advice alone carries a lower level of requirements than one also covering custody and administration. That is a genuine response to part of what we raised, and it comes with an invitation to discuss scope before filing. It addresses the gate. It does not address the Article 81 suitability file, the Article 67 prudential floor, or DORA classification, which is where the disproportion in our scenario actually sits. Mathis Campestrin of Bruzzo Dubucq put the first year transition envelope for a French wealth firm at up to 500,000 euros in Gestion de Fortune . The AMF's answer is that advice only costs less than custody. True, and never the comparison in dispute. Where It Cuts Against Us: Remuneration, Disclaimers, and the Order of Operations Three amendments to our own position, in the order they hurt. Remuneration is not the perimeter test. We wrote that fees should flow from the client and that the moment a provider pays for flow, no structuring survives that. The AMF's individual communication carve outs apply contre rémunération ou à titre gratuit . A paid indication that a CASP exists sits outside the perimeter, provided it is not personalised. Our rule remains sound conflicts practice and sound commercial hygiene. It is not the legal test. Personalisation is, and Consultancy B in our original piece fails on personalisation and inducement, not on the invoice. Disclaimers are load bearing, in one direction only. We wrote that a disclaimer stapled to a personalised steer will not save the steer. That still holds. What we did not have is the other half. The AMF makes the statement that the firm is not authorised to give personalised crypto recommendations, together with white list signposting, a condition of three of its four individual communication carve outs. The disclaimer does not rescue a recommendation. It qualifies a non recommendation. Both things are true. The perimeter now has a clock in it. The prospect carve out applies avant toute étude patrimoniale ou toute collecte d'information sur sa situation personnelle . Before. And the AMF warns separately that where a firm already holds information on a client's situation through an existing advisory relationship, there is a risk both that the client misreads the applicable framework and that the communication qualifies as crypto asset advice. Read that against our engagement model. A consultancy that has spent three months mapping a client's settlement architecture, transaction volumes and jurisdictional footprint holds more information about that client than any wealth manager holds about a retail saver. We treated that depth as the thing that made the work valuable and said the personalised element was not the difficult bit. The AMF's reasoni