The Financial Conglomerates Directive (FCD) included a provision to review its working by 2007. However, this has now been extended to 2009 in the light of the implications of the financial turmoil. The Review will focus on three areas: some definitions, the extent of the scope of the Directive and internal control mechanisms.
The FCD introduced group-wide supervision of financial conglomerates and requires closer co-operation and information sharing among supervisory authorities across sectors. It attempted to align the rules for financial conglomerates with those for homogeneous financial groups (dealing in a single financial sector, such as banking), given the accelerating consolidation in the financial services sector, creating cross-sectoral financial groups with activities in both the banking/investment services and insurance sectors.