21 June 2018

AFME response to the Commission’s amendments to the delegated act supplementing MiFID II on suitability requirements

Private sector funding is needed. However, the private sector can only provide the necessary additional finance through developed capital markets. Although EU initiatives such as the Capital Markets Union (CMU) and the Investment Plan for Europe have been helpful, Europe generally still relies heavily on bank lending. Policy actions in the context of the CMU will therefore have to encourage private investments and increase this focus on a sustainable finance framework. Therefore, it is vital that the EU continues its work on the CMU to build Europe’s capital markets capacity, jointly with the banking sector capacity.

Many CMU initiatives were successful in removing obstacles for issuers and investors to access capital markets. Additional work is necessary to increase allocation towards sustainable investments, for instance by further developing the green securitisation market, enhancing the European pension investments and reviewing incentives to promote equity financing.

A workable, flexible and dynamic taxonomy is a pivotal initiative which should be achieved prior to any important review of existing financial regulations, including MiFID II. AFME believes that the progressive development of a sustainability taxonomy with strong involvement from sustainability and financial market experts is a pre-requisite to achieve the objective of integrating ESG considerations into the investment and advisory process in a consistent manner across sectors.

Any attempt to rush the incorporation of ESG considerations within the MiFID II suitability assessment without a rigorous process which includes phasing requirements, longer implementation times and more consultation with industry participants will harm the overall objective of the Commission’s action plan. More concretely, without the establishment of the EU taxonomy first, firms providing investment advice and portfolio management would not have clear, common criteria to use to ascertain the degree of an investment’s sustainability and compare these investments appropriately. Implementing changes to the MiFID II suitability rules to require financial advisers to integrate sustainability into their suitability assessments without an established EU taxonomy would lead to inconsistent and divergent comparisons of sustainable investments and could increase the ‘greenwashing’ risks which the EC is trying to tackle.

Full response

© AFME