Insurance Europe: Financial industry joins to warn EC about inappropriate timeframe to apply new EU sustainability disclosure rules

20 September 2019

A large group of financial industry associations — including Insurance Europe — has raised serious concerns in a joint letter to the European Commission regarding the current application timeline for new EU disclosure rules for sustainable investments and sustainability risks.

While supporting the Commission’s objectives of financing a more sustainable economy, the signatories warned that the Regulation is very likely to become applicable before the related Level 2 measures — which explain how the Regulation should be implemented by companies — are even adopted.

This will create significant compliance challenges and liability risks for the financial companies which need to apply the Regulation, as well as confusion for investors.

The signatories therefore urged the Commission to take immediate action to ensure that the financial industry is provided with a realistic timeframe for implementation.

To this end, the signatories suggested that the application of the new requirements in the Regulation takes place at least one year after all the Level 2 texts are published in the Official Journal of the EU.

The other signatories are:

• The Association for Financial Markets in Europe (AFME)
• The Alternative Investment Management Association (AIMA)
• The Association of Mutual Insurers and Insurance Cooperatives in Europe (AMICE)
• The European Association of Cooperative Banks (EACB)
• The European Banking Federation (EBF)
• The European Fund and Asset Management Association (EFAMA)
• PensionsEurope

Full joint letter on Insurance Europe

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