It was an early start on a sunny morning here in Barcelona. The twelfth European Blockchain Convention is underway. You walk through the gardens to reach the Palau de Congressos de Catalunya, past the palm trees, and the hall is right there at garden level in Pedralbes.
As you walk in, you are greeted by smiling hosts and refreshments. The event is steadily filling up as you stroll over to the exhibition area. Outside the rooms there is a deal floor tied to the networking app, and two stages beyond that.
Victoria Gago and Daniel Salmerón, Co-CEOs and Co-Founders of the EBC, took the main stage just after 9am.
The Opening of EBC 2026: Setting Europe’s Agenda
Gago opened on the marketplace, not the manifesto.
“This is our 12th edition. We started the event in 2018,” she told the room. Some years they ran two EBCs, which is how the numbering got here. Today, she said, the point is to do business.
“For us, EBC is Europe’s marketplace. We want you to do business here.” She continued that: “we want you to find a new investor. We want you to find a new team member.”
She pointed people at the app and the deal floor outside, then at two days of sessions on tokenisation, stablecoins, hedge funds, and on-chain asset management.
Barcelona, and a More Institutional Room
Salmerón picked up the thing that is different this year.
“What makes this edition very special is that it’s very institutional,” he said.
The early EBC, he reminded attendees, was built to get the whole ecosystem in one place. NFTs, metaverse, web3. That is no longer the centre of gravity.
“Over the years we’ve been converting EBC into an institutional event,” Salmerón said. “We’ve got a lot of attendees from asset managers, financial institutions, insurance, governments… It’s a reflection of how the market is maturing.”
That is the same turn Disruption Banking saw in London in February at Digital Assets Forum, EBC’s sister brand. The Digital Assets Forum launched in 2023 as an institutional event from day one, it is currently three editions in, with a fourth set for February 2027 in London. New York follows EBC Barcelona on 13 November and Abu Dhabi is dated for 15 April. Same team, he said, not two companies.
What They Flagged in the Room
Gago used the close to name two European builds she wanted on the floor, not only on the agenda.
One is Regulated Layer One, sponsor of the second stage. She explained that she was excited that “around 25-30 financial institutions in Europe are going together, building a layer one.”
The other is Qivalis. “Another very exciting project is, for me, Qivalis,” she said. “It’s around 40 financial institutions in Europe going together, building a euro-denominated stablecoin.”
Both, in her telling, are Europe doing what Europe does. Many institutions, one rail. Slower than a single balance sheet. Still the story in the room.
The Agenda For the Next Two Days
The programme that follows is built around the decisions those institutions now have to make. Tokenisation, stablecoins and settlement, custody, market structure. The first session was up next.
The day has just gotten underway, with more stories to follow very soon.
Author: Grace Sharp
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