Articles from 22-28 October 2021
Banking Union
Opening remarks by Commissioner Mairead McGuinness at the press conference on the Banking Package 2021 : We are addressing the flaws that remain in prudential rules, while avoiding a significant increase in the overall capital requirements of our banks.
Basel III package: EBF calls for further dialogue to secure Europe’s economic growth : The proposal puts forward several aspects identified by the EBF ... permanent solutions must be adopted to maintain banks’ current capital ratios without reducing their capacity to finance the economic recovery and to fund Europe’s digital transformation and sustainable transition.
AFME: Do European banks need much more capital? : Despite assertions by the authorities to the contrary, these proposals will require European banks to raise significant additional amounts of equity capital to maintain their current ratios.
FBF: Final transposition of Basel 3 still remains insufficient to ensure a sustainable European economic sovereignty : The proposal still fails to respect the commitment by the national and European authorities that this transposition would not lead to a significant increase in capital for all banking communities.
BDB Christian Ossig on the implementation of Basel IV : The European Commission’s proposals for implementing the Basel rules are a step in the right direction. But they do not yet go far enough.
SSM's Fernandez-Bollo interview : Wide-ranging interview: including "The danger would be to get stuck in the present situation, where the vast majority of the surveyed banks say climate risk is very important to them, but most of those also say, “We don't have the tools to measure it”.
Capital Markets Union
CCP SUPERVISORY COMMITTEE CHAIR DELIVERS KEYNOTE SPEECH AT THE SECOND EACH CCP RISK MANAGEMENT SUMMIT : The Chair of ESMA’s CCP Supervisory Committee, Klaus Löber, today delivered a keynote speech on the role of CCPs in supporting the safety and efficiency of global financial markets.
CEPS: Setting EU CCP policy – much more than meets the eye : A new study ‘Setting EU CCP policy – much more than meets the eye’, now calls for a long-term vision for the future of the European clearing market, by taking financial stability, efficiency, and market development objectives into account. V
Joint call for evidence on the European Commission mandate regarding the PRIIPs Regulation : The input provided will feed into the ESAs’ technical advice to the European Commission on a review of the key information document (KID) for PRIIPs.
EFAMA Statement on the ECON Committee’s draft report amending the UCITS directive for PRIIPs : We are relieved to hear that the European Parliament’s ECON Committee proposed on Friday an extension of the UCITS exemption for funds with full support of the Council.
IOSCO updates its outsourcing principles to ensure operational resilience : The updated Principles on Outsourcing are based on the earlier Outsourcing Principles forMarket Intermediaries and for Markets, but their application has been expanded and nowincludes trading venues, intermediaries market participants acting on a proprietary basis andcredit rating agencies.
Environmental, Social, Governance (ESG)
World Economic Forum: 57 organizations release open letter for EU to act on ESG : They encourage the European Commission to promote a global baseline set of standards through supporting the IFRS Foundation on the launch of the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB).
GFIA: COP26: Insurers publish key principles for more resilient and sustainable construction : Given that natural hazards are on the rise both in terms of frequency and severity, climate adaptation considerations should lie at the very heart of building norms and processes.
AFME: GFMA and BCG report says pace of adoption and growth of emissions trading schemes is not sufficient to limit global warming to 1.5C : A new report by the Global Financial Markets Association (GFMA) and Boston Consulting Group (BCG) titled, “Unlocking the Potential of Carbon Markets to Achieve Global Net Zero”, finds that close to 80% of greenhouse gas emissions are not covered by regulated carbon pricing today.
ACCA: Good intentions are ‘disconnected from the pace of climate action that is urgently needed’, says new research : Organisations urgently need to set net zero targets and the pathways to achieve them
ESAs propose new rules for taxonomy-related product disclosures : The disclosures relate to financial products that make sustainable investments contributing to environmental objectives.
Fin Tech Regulation
Vox: Central bank digital currencies, cryptocurrencies, and privacy: What experiments tell us : With the development of new forms of money such as cryptocurrencies and central bank digital currencies, the attention paid to their role as a store of privacy is increasing. This column asks whether privacy is relevant in shaping the demand for these currencies.
SUERF: The one trillion euro CBDC: Issuing a digital euro without disrupting the bank lending channel : Introducing a general-purpose Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC) carries the risk of bank disintermediation, potentially jeopardizing financial stability and monetary policy transmission through the bank lending channel.
Economic Policies Impacting EU Finance
EURACTIV: National digital taxes and US sanctions to be withdrawn after OECD tax deal : The national digital taxes should be phased out as soon as the OECD tax deal is put into practice, the US and European states agreed. In return, the US promised to drop the sanctions it had imposed in response.
Brexit
City AM: Forget the pandemic: Brexit’s impact on UK economy will be much worse, warns fiscal chief : The consequences of the UK leaving the European Union will be much more serious than the economic impact of the pandemic, the boss of the UK’s fiscal watchdog warns this morning.