23 June 2021

CSFI: 174th Brussels 4 Breakfast - June 23

The top agenda item in Brussels and for our panel is the ESG agenda - particularly the so-called 'taxonomy' and the pilot exercise for stress-testing banks on climate risk (and not just banks; insurers and corporates will be caught too)

Why you should watch:  The top agenda item in Brussels and for our panel is the ESG agenda - particularly the so-called 'taxonomy' and the pilot exercise for stress-testing banks on climate risk (and not just banks; insurers and corporates will be caught too). Other than that, our regular panel focused this month on the EU's Next Generation Fund (is it a 'one off' or a sign of the Commission's ambitions?), CMU (has the pandemic pushed it down the agenda?), the CCP stress tests (and what they say about Commission movies to shift clearing houses out of London), Germany's continued opposition to central banks stuffing themselves with home country debt (that's you, Italy), and the latest opinion polls in the UK indicating that (whatever they now think of Brexit) a majority is in favour of staying out.

Moderator: Andrew Hilton (Director, CSFI) 

 Panellists:

 Graham Bishop is one of the UK's leading commentators on EU financial regulation. He is also chairman of the National Council of the European Movement, and was, for many years, senior European bond analyst at Citigroup

 Andreas Dombret is a former Executive Board Member at the Bundesbank, responsible for banking and financial supervision. He is also a former Board member at the BIS, a former Vice-chairman of BofA's investment bank for EMEA, and a former partner at Rothschild & Co. Currently, he is Chairman of Houlihan Lokey (a Los Angeles-based investment bank) for Germany, Austria and Switzerland, a senior adviser to Oliver Wyman and Sumitomo Mitsui, and an adjunct scholar at Columbia. He is also an honorary professor at ESB University in Wiesbaden.

 Pablo Portugal is a managing director at the Association for Financial Markets in Europe (AFME), where he is responsible for regulatory developments and advocacy across Europe in banking and financial markets. He is also a Board member of the European Capital Markets Institute.

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GrahamBishop.com provided a rich list of topics for the meeting - but of course we were not able to discuss them all as we ran out of time - as usual!

Brexit: Curtice opinion poll: now Remain 53%, Leave 47% BUT Rejoin 48%, Stay out 52%; Reuters: Britain takes step to classifying 'green' investments: Britain has set up a group of experts to help it classify climate-friendly assets; City of London Corporation: Data, Direction, Dialogue: UK and US have an opportunity to collaborate; Bloomberg: ECB Probes Whether Goldman, Peers Still Too Tied to London: ECB concerned about reliance on back-to-back booking model

General: Switzerland breaks off talks with EU; Commission set to borrow €80billion this year and first issues 10 time over-subscribed; Tax transparency deal approved – country-by-country reporting

Banking: POLITICO: Germany says nein to eurozone banking safeguards; Non-Performing Loans (NPLs): Co-legislators agree on new rules in order to improve market transparency; FSB seeks feedback on its proposals for quantitative targets for enhancing cross-border payments

Capital Markets Union: ESMA launches 2021 Central Counterparties Stress Test; DG FISMA: Staff working document – Monitoring progress towards a capital markets union: a toolkit of indicators; ESMA responds to European Commission consultation on the ESAs

Insurance: Reuters: The European Commission said it is too early for a cross-border pandemic insurance scheme to fill the gap left by insurers following the outbreak of Covid-19

ESG: EBA publishes results of EU-wide pilot exercise on climate risk; FT van Steenis: Investors should prepare for impact of green stress tests on banks; Sustainable corporate governance - Continuing flow of comments on Taxonomy Article 8; Eurosif expects new EU sustainable finance strategy at the start of July

Digital: European Commission’s proposal of a Digital Markets Act – EBF Key messages; Commission proposes a trusted and secure Digital Identity for all Europeans; CER: Can the EU set a global rulebook for Big Tech?

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