EFR: Need to review trade and regulatory barriers

19 May 2004

In a joint press release the European Financial Services Roundtable (EFR) and the US Financial Services Roundtable are calling for the liberalization of trade barriers and a review of disparate regulatory systems that restrict the delivery of financial products and services.

Members of both organisations agreed to cooperate in order to:

achieve mutual recognition of corporate governance regimes in the EU and the US

encourage Congress to initiate a review of regulatory changes imposed by Sarbanes-Oxley

encourage efforts to develop mutual recognition of adequate and equivalent consumer protection and supervisory regimes for banks, insurers and financial services groups

endorse convergence of high quality accounting standards.

Both organisations also note that the current IAS proposals 32 and 39 and ID 5 do not meet these criteria, and therefore suggest a delay in formalizing these rules until the industry’s concerns have been addressed.

Press release

© EFR - European Financial Services Round Table