European Financial Regulation: how to make it more workable

European Financial Regulation: how to make it more workable

Eddy Wymeersch,

University of Gent

Summary

Everyone working in the field of financial regulation – but in other fields as well – is struck by the great number of documents that are being proposed or adopted in this field by the international institutions (FSB, BCBS, BIS, OECD, etc.), but even in greater quantity,  by the European  institutions. The present paper is aimed at exposing this problem and its increasing complexity, leading to a risk of destabilising the financial regulatory system, creating overlaps and gaps, and possibly engaging the liability of financial institutions. But the problem can be solved. The first and most practical solution consists of organising an integrated website where all texts of whatever nature are posted in a coordinated way, integrating the respective changes and the implementing documents, including level 3, q&a’s, recommendations and other authoritative statements. As in many fields, national legislation remains applicable, it should be included.

 An initiative from the European institutions would be most welcome.

The regulation and supervision of financial activity in the EU is the subject of a complex system of regulation and supervision. An overview of the different layers of regulation and accompanying measures will illustrate this.

In the field of prudential regulation and supervision of banks, the overall measures have been adopted at the EU level and take the form of directives and regulations. These Directives are applicable in the 28 EU member states, under the form of transposing national legislation, hence become national law restating the directive obligations according to national concepts, terminology but also exceptions and reservations where allowed in the Directive. In addition, Regulations from different sources contain most of the detailed provisions to be applied by the entities concerned. Even in Regulations there is sometimes room for somewhat specific national regimes. The most important regulations are adopted by Council and Parliament, which often charge the Commission with further elaboration in detailed provisions, the regulatory principles having been laid down in the Regulation. These are then Commission delegated regulations, expanding, amending or supplementing the Directives or the category of Regulations of the European Parliament and the Council.  Further down the hierarchy, the European Banking Authority is often asked to develop further more technical provisions: these are the Regulatory Technical Standards (RTS), or the Implementing regulations (ITS, the latter of a more formal, organisational nature). After having been scrutinised by Council and Parliament, these instruments are formally adopted by the European Commission, although with the understanding that the Commission will not modify or adapt the provisions as proposed by the Authority[1].  Technically, these documents are Commission regulations and have the same binding force as all other regulations, i.e., they are directly applicable to those to whom they are addressed, being depending on the case, the national financial supervisors, or the business firms to whom they are applicable. This multi-layered system of regulation is overly complex, difficult to follow, often confusing and very time consuming. Moreover, they are enacted over a considerable period of time, making is difficult for addressees to determine the status of the applicable law. Also there no central source where all these documents are available, whether in their final form, but also as proposals. Working in this field is comparable to a continuous chase for the most recent status of information, whereby the not yet published information is usually more valuable than the officially available one.  Once the building stones of the post-crisis financial regulation will have been put in place- what is likely to take many more years –  it would be welcome to assess the system from the angle of its transparency and efficiency. To a certain extent, this state of affairs can be related to questions of legitimacy and protection of individual rights.

But this is not all: the regulatory apparatus is further completed by diverse, less formal instruments which do not carry the same binding force. These are the recommendations, the guidelines, the “questions and answers” and other informal tools that the European institutions use to guide actual practice. These provisions are not legally binding and cannot be enforced before the competent jurisdictions, but this does not mean that not respecting them will be without consequences. So e.g. with respect to the “recommendations and guidelines”, the European Supervisory Authorities or ESAs [2] will be entitled to publish the names of the member states and of their supervisory authorities that have notified that they did not comply with a recommendation or guidelines (“comply or explain”).  The calculation is that the publication will motivate that authority to follow the guidelines, in order to avoid the blame of being considered non-compliant. The authorities also launch peer reviews, which may point to certain deficiencies, but up to now the approach has been used with great circumspection[3]. A still largely unexplored field is that of the civil liability of the financial institutions for not following up on the recommendations or guidelines, on the basis that these present the standard for not diligent and responsible bank management. Judiciary sanctions for national soft law instruments are known at the national level[4].

In addition, one should of course also mention the decisions of the European Court of Justice as an important source of law: in the field of financial regulation, some decisions have been rendered which have significantly influenced the supervisory activity[5].

The described regulatory architecture is not proper to the field of banking regulation: it is also in place with respect to the regulation of the securities markets, and for the field of insurance and occupational pensions. Very often the same regulatory techniques are used in these domains but the basic regulation is of course different.

The above mentioned overview of the regulatory structure applies to all 28 European  Member States, and to the States member of the European Economic Area[6]. In the field of banking regulation, an additional, somewhat different set of rules apply: this feature is part of the Banking Union applicable to the 19 Member States that use the euro as a common currency. The relationship between the provisions proper to the Banking Union and the generally applicable EU financial regulation deserves some more detailed description.

The Banking Union aims at creating an integrated system of banking regulation, with supervision centralised in one institution. With respect to prudential supervision, that institution is the European Central Bank, the supervisory function being exercised by its Supervisory board, an internal organ within the ECB. The fields of bank recovery and resolution are the subject of a different body of rules, applied by a Union agency, the Single Resolution Board. In both cases the constitutional provisions relating to these new bodies have been laid down in a Regulation adopted by Council and Parliament, implying the agreement of the 28 Member States. They are referred to as the Single Supervisory Mechanism and the Single Resolution Mechanism (SSM and SRM), each governed by its own Regulation[7]. These Regulations organise the function of the two bodies and introduce the basic rules for their functioning and in that sense take precedence over identical provisions laid down in the laws and regulations that are applicable in the 28 Member States.

Probably due to the differences in the timing of their adoption – and the then ongoing government bonds crisis- the SSM regulation contains rather few substantive provisions, but is concentrated on the tasks and powers of the ECB, the central supervisor that was planned to take over all banking supervision in the euro area. The substantive provisions of banking supervision therefore are to be found in the nationally applicable provisions, this is in the EU Regulations that are directly applicable, but also  in the national law and regulations  transposing the EU Directives[8]. As these Regulations or Directives often contain the right for Member States to adopt derogatory or supplementary provisions, these national provisions will also apply to the ECB in its supervisory function (these are the “options and discretions”[9]) provided that the option was granted to the Member States, not to the national supervisors or to the firms addressee of the provision[10].  Further instruments may be based on the action of the ECB: it may issue “regulations, guidelines or general instructions to national supervisors”, but only with respect to the way tasks will be performed or decisions adopted by the national supervisors. It would seem that the regulatory powers are mainly addressed to procedures and cooperation, but  not to matters of substantive prudential supervision[11].  When the ECB adopts “recommendations or guidelines” on matters of substance, these will follow the Union law, but also the RTS and Implementing acts adopted by the Commission on the proposal of the EBA, including article 16 of the EBA regulation. This latter reference allows the ECB to derogate or to not apply the “guidelines or recommendation” of the EBA by stating its reasons. It would not allow the ECB to not applying the EBA proposed and Commission adopted regulations, but it may develop its own regulation[12]

On the basis of a general clause in the SSM regulation, the ECB has been designated as” being considered the competent authority”, i.e.  the banking supervisor in each of the 19 Member States[13].  It will exercise the powers that would have belonged to the national supervisors before the creation of the Banking union, although its action will be based, not on the national banking law, but on the SSM regulation, and ultimately on the Treaty, article 127(6). As a consequence, it will act on the basis of regulations and be entitled to directly intervene in the national legal order, regulations being directly applicable. With respect to directives, it will exercise the powers that have been attributed to the national supervisors in the national legislations, having been substituted to these national supervisors. The system is therefore considerably mixed, being rooted partly in directly applicable EU law, partly in national law transposing EU directives. The interaction of both levels of regulatory provisions creates considerable problems, as national legislation implementing directives, especially CRD IV, often has followed specific national approaches or criteria. Legally, the ECB cannot develop its own views and set aside the national regulation approach, unless the national regulation would not be in conformity with the Directive. Solutions to this problem cannot be found on the basis of existing law, but should be solved by adapting the Directive, or a regulation where applicable.

The SRM regulation contains some interesting features as well. The relationship between the SSM Regulation and national law is comparable, in this case relating to the national provisions transposing the Directive on Banking Recovery and Resolution (BRRD)[14]. That directive contains a great number of delegations for additional regulatory work by the Commission, in many cases involving EBA.

However differently from the SSM, the SRM regulation also contains numerous substantive provisions as to how the Single Resolution Board will exercise its powers in resolution cases, often merely copying the text of the BRRD. By doing so, the regulation changes the legal nature of the directive provisions, which become a directly applicable regulation, and not anymore a directive provision which should be transposed in national law, the latter being the basis from which the Single Resolution Board would have drawn its authority.  The SRM regulation will prevail over national law.

As is the case in the SSM, the Single Resolution Board will be “considered the relevant national resolution authority for the application of the BRRD and the SRM Reg[15]” and hence apply national resolution law as transposed from the BRRD for the matters that have not been fully regulated in the SRM Regulation. It will be bound by the EBA developed RTS and implementing regulations. Also the EBA ‘recommendations and guidelines” will be applied, however under the proviso that if these are not applied, the Board will have to declare this non-application to the EBA (“comply and explain”). This feature allows to take account of the composition of the EBA where the 28 Member States decide about rulemaking, there where the Banking Union if only binding on the 19 euro area Member States.

Different from the approach adopted in SSM, is the provision that the SRB might be subject to the EBA procedures on the settlement of disagreements between supervisors in cross border situations, as laid down in article 19(3) EBA Reg especially. This conflicts settlement procedure would only apply in cases where the BRRD provides for a similar procedure between national resolution authorities[16]. As the Single Resolution Board is the single resolution authority in the euro area, it cannot not be applied to conflicts between itself and the national resolution authorities, as the latter have to implement the instructions given by the Single Resolution Board [17].approach adopted in

One should wonder what are the effects of the extraordinary complexity of the present system of regulation on the actual application of the different provisions, on its cost and its efficiency. Practitioners in the field complain that they are unable to follow the developments, especially as these are coming from different sources which are not necessarily linked. Implementation may lead to surprises, some of which may even amount to a breach of the law. Supervised entities complain that they are confronted with successive layers of regulation and requirements, especially calling for repetitive documentation requirements, which makes banking business increasingly difficult and for strengthening the banks’ administrative functions to the detriment of the financial ones. Regulators and supervisors complain about the complexity, especially about the difficulty to coordinate the European legal provisions, with the national rules and practices, where these are applicable simultaneously or as default rules. Researchers are confronted with real difficulty to follow developments in a certain field. It would therefore be useful to introduce more clarity, initially in terms of the formal structure of the regulations and develop later on an overarching and integrated view on these regulatory provisions.

The task is not a simple one: substantive coordination between the different sources of regulation would obviously be difficult as discussions on the content would reopen the political discussions which one hoped to have been settled once and for all. But progress can be made not only in formal legislative coordination, but also on some well defined substantive fields.

Some important progress has already been achieved:  the three ESAs coordinate their regulatory work in the Joint Committee which is in charge of “reaching joint positions” for matters that are of importance to the three of or two ESAs. In fields of overlapping competences this cooperation has worked well and has avoided too wide differences among respective regulation. Good examples are the PRIIPS regulation and the work on financial conglomerates[18].  The work program of the Joint Committee illustrates the numerous activities for the next year[19]. The cross-selling of financial products, request to the European Commission  to address legislative inconsistencies between the banking, insurance and investment sectors,  or a discussion paper on automation in financial advice[20], while the regulation of financial conglomerates belongs to the agenda of this committee[21].

The coordination with the other players, especially the Commission or the ECB has been less visible, although these bodies participate in some of the rulemaking process. The concerns about a more integrated approach within the banking field is visible in some tools that have been developed by the ESAs: the EBA’s Interactive Single Rule book integrates level 1 provisions with “Q and A”s and guidelines. Up to now, the version of the  rulebook covers CRD IV, CRR and BRRD, but does not contain references to Commission regulations, not to other statements such as those of the ESRB, or of the national supervisors, including the ECB. From a practical point of view, it would be helpful to be able to obtain a full overview on how a specific matter has been dealt with, presenting a widely conceived integrated rulebook. The two other ESAs seem to have given less importance to this aspect.

More should be done. It would be helpful, in an initial stage at least, that the numerous regulations in the three fields (banking, securities and insurance) and whatever their legal nature, would be collected and included in a comprehensive and reliable inventory of financial regulation and be made easily – i.e. electronically – accessible. The instrument to be developed  would not only insure transparency as far as the regulatory system is concerned. It should also provide for a fully coordinated version of these measures, as today many amendments have been introduced in different instruments that are not very well known to even regular users of these regulations, and may sometimes surprise them.

Today, a valuable approach has been put in place under the form of Eurlex, the central database  offering access in 24 languages of many European documents, but it does not allow, at least in my experience to a sufficiently discriminating search[22].

On the other hand the Commission is willing to listen to suggestions coming from users, as well as those coming from government official and public institutions[23]

A more substantive initiative is needed, allowing to access an integrated regulatory system, that would bring the EU system of regulations up to the standards that are followed in most of the Member States. The regulatory scheme should be restated in the context of the institutional framework of EU regulation, where Council and Parliament play the leading role in the more fundamental regulations expressing the principles of the respective regulatory systems, while the Commission is in charge of further elaborating on these fundamental provisions The comparison is readily made with the national systems where the laws are adopted by the Parliaments, and the executive decrees by the government. In that context it would be useful to go back to the terminology used in the Lamfalussy report[24] which distinguished level 1 en level 2 regulations.  Today, too often detailed regulation is found in level 1 measures, expressing the political compromise of the day. Both level 1, level 2 and other types of measures should be included in a “Handbook of EU banking regulations” conveying a ‘consolidated picture’ of the applicable provisions. Similar handbooks would be developed for insurance and securities.

The development of this Handbook would allow to review the rulemaking procedures, as these are quite complex and burdensome, and in comparison with national legislative work require much more time and discussions.  Any reform of this type would necessarily respect the fundamental balances of power between the European institutions, and subject to a call back by Parliament and Council.

 In the future the Level 1 regulations should essentially consist of the regulations as adopted by Council and Parliament that constitute the basic framework of the regulatory structure: by way of example, this would be the CRR, Mifid 2 or the Solvency II Regulation. These are the European banking, securities and insurance laws.

Directives are of a different nature, being addressed to the Member States. One should analyse which part of these directives could be integrated in the regulation: As far as CRD IV is concerned, and taking into account the experience that has now been accumulated, it seems likely that many directive provisions could be integrated in the Regulation as the national implementation legislation is largely congruent: a good example are the options and discretions, many of which have lost their purpose or are widely accepted. This would increasingly simplify and clarify the legal regimes across borders allowing for more efficiency and comparability in supervision. Common provisions – such as the definitions, the review clauses, the provisions on the delegation of powers, the conflict resolution provisions – should not be repeated but could better be regrouped in one section, declared applicable for the entire body of regulations.

This does not mean that the national transposing decisions should be totally abandoned. Specific national regimes should be maintained if justified on the basis of the experience that has been accumulated in the meantime.  Therefore, a separate section would include the directive provisions that have given rise to more than formal different approaches in national legislation.

With respect to the level 2, at present there are several types of implementing regulations: all are ultimately adopted by the Commission, and are drafted with the assistance – or on the initiative of the ESAs, whether on the basis of an express provision in the delegating regulation, or on a de facto basis. All take the legal form of a regulation. In all cases Parliament and Council – with some negligible exceptions – have a final right of regard.

Does it make sense to further distinguish these three different types of implementing regulations? Would it not be simpler to create one single regime, respecting the underlying institutional balance? As mentioned, they are most of the time formally adopted along the lines developed by the ESAs, but without putting the Commission’s power to amend in danger. The public consultation that should normally be part of the regulatory process should take place at that level, and should not be duplicated at Commission level. The public consultation process should be strengthened and allow for a wide input from all stakeholders, including the professional organisations, in full presence of the Commission and of the representatives of the ESAs and their members. In order to ensure that the Commission remains fully informed and in charge of the end product it should be fully implicated in the different stages of the negotiation. And it should also clearly and publicly bear full responsibility for the end product.

The present proposal would consist of integrating the Level 2 regulations of different kinds into one since document, avoiding contradictions, overlaps, but also ensuring maximum consistency.

An special section in the Level 2 regulations would be the national provisions that pursuant to the level 1 or 2 provisions, can be maintained by the national legislators. It would also contain those provisions of national law that remain into force after the harmonisation provisions have take full effect, e.g. circulars, implementing decisions, etc. In this section, national regulation that may still be adopted notwithstanding the EU regulation should also be clearly and openly mentioned, as cross border activities should be fully aware of the different national regimes.

The level 3 provisions being recommendations, guidelines, Q and A and whatever other instruments that supervisors may developed could be included in a level 3 layer. Whether that layer should consist of a separate collection of provisions is open for discussion: it could be included in the level 1 or 2 documents under the form of a link, giving immediate electronic access to these further instruments. This is the practice that has already been developed by the EBA in its “single Rulebook”.

Whether further instruments should enrich this handbook is open for discussion: some will plead for inclusion, whether in full text or by way of an URL  link, e.g. of Commission consultation papers, or consultation outcomes, or reports by other bodies such as the ECB, and similar preparatory instruments along with reports and decisions of the Parliament. Finally, there may also be room for including leading court cases, certainly by the ECJ, but also by national supreme courts.

This comprehensive instrument will inevitably be a very voluminous one, to be adapted and updated frequently. Some will object that it would be difficult to consult as containing too much information. Modern technology will considerably facilitate access. There are many excellent example of performing IT programmes: as far as the ones the undersigned is similar with, good reference points would be the existing sites of national legislative sources dealing with equally complex legislative instruments, such as e.g. the UK government site, where the publication of the Companies act 2006[25], or the French Code monetaire et financier [26] illustrates how efficient this technique of documentation can be. Both relate to very complex and detailed instruments informing users of the different stages of implementation or of the different level of implementation, indicating the successive formulations of the provisions of the regulation and its planned changes, along with the dates of entry into force. Differences in the application depending on the different regional subdivisions of the respective jurisdictions – in the case, the different Member States – would allow for very effective consultations even on geographically differentiated application.

This ideal model for an EU handbook would certainly be a very labour intensive enterprise. But it seems the price that the EU legislator has to pay to make its regulatory system meet the needs of the EU citizens.  The EU legislators are fully aware of the gaps in the present system and have take some, limited steps to alleviate these concerns.

Considerable efforts in the direction of a more user friendly and coordinated regulatory apparatus have already been adopted. A few points can be mentioned here.

The three ESA originally were based on largely identical regulations, facilitating the analysis and allowing for the development of a single practice. However, later on changes were introduced that are proper to one of the ESAs[27], although some of these provisions could have made common to the two other ESAs.

As mentioned above, each of these EU instruments contain long lists of definitions. Very often these definitions are the same in several regulations or directive. But it is not sure that the same definitions are used, or that slight differences of formulation may not have been introduced without a clear intention to change. It would have been useful to have one list of definitions, to which references can be made in other documents, unless specific derogatory definitions are used in a specific document. In the banking field the definitions of the CRR serve as the standard reference.

Some substantive references appear in numerous regulations or directive provisions: this is the case for the provisions that confer regulatory power to the Commission or to EBA.  Here again a standard definition would simplify the reasoning and avoid slight differences giving rise to different interpretations. So e.g. the reference to the “settlement of disagreements between authorities in cross border situation or across sectors” (article 19 and 20 of the ESA regulations) which has been used very frequently in several regulatory instruments, especially also in the BRRD. The reference could merely signal the application of article 19 in brief words, and avoid small changes being introduced afterwards.

The need of developing more efficient tools for dealing with this multifarious regulatory apparatus has been clearly identified in the early years of the financial re-regulation. It was Tommaso Padoa Schioppa who launched the idea of the “single rulebook”[28]. This idea has been taken up by the EBA who developed an interesting interactive instrument based on the level 1 regulation and conveying information on its RTS and ITS, its guidelines, questions and answers. At EBA, this tool is still under development and should be enriched by many other data from the supervisory activity. ESMA is following a different path, announcing in its 2016 “strategic orientation” that its will “substantially decrease its resources committed to completing the single rulebook. … We do this by cooperating closely with NCAs and building our expertise and reputation”.[29] It would be interesting to have a better understanding of this change in policy.

These different considerations only deal with the accessibility of the European and national provisions. Improvements would be greatly appreciated. But improvements on the content would be even more welcome. Concerns have been voiced about overlapping provisions, conflicting provisions in different regulations, or about so-called “unintended consequences”. The latter are particularly detrimental as they may lead to grave distortions in the markets. The remark has several times be made about the fate of the securitisation market, one of the instruments strongly supported in the Commission’s Capital Market Union proposal as a device for revitalising the economy. Securitisation is still heavily burdened by bad experiences from the banking crisis times but also by still existing restrictions in the capital requirements provisions, especially also in the Solvency II directive. A recent Commission initiative on STS securitisation[30] seems however to be blocked in Parliament.

The Commission is aware of the concerns and has published a Commission services working document[31].  In this “Call for evidence on EU regulatory Framework for Financial Services” attention is drawn to the “interactions between large amounts of regulatory provisions,[ for which] there is a need to understand their combined impact and whether they give rise to any unintended consequences”.[32]

Conclusion

Regulation in the financial services field has grown exponentially after the financial crisis, up to the point of become unmanageable. Time has come to put some order in this field, and to provide for clarity and accessibility. Two strand of action can be identified: the first one aims at technical clarity of the numerous European provisions and their interaction with the national ones. The second one concern the more difficult substantive coherence, In both field initiatives have been taken, and these should be more actively pursued

[1] See the statement by the Commission on:  http://ec.europa.eu/finance/bank/regcapital/acts/rts/index_en.htm

[2] These are; Regulation 1093/2010 of 24 November 2010 establishing a European Supervisory Authority (European Banking Authority) amending Decision 716/2009/EC and repealing Commission Decision 2009/78/EC, as amended; Regulation (EU) 1094/2010 of 24 November 2010 establishing a European Supervisory Authority (European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority) amending Decision 716/2009/EC and repealing Commission Decision 2009/79/EC; Regulation 1095/2010 of 24 November 2010 establishing a European Supervisory Authority (European Securities and Markets Authority) amending Decision716/2009/EC and repealing Commission Decision 2009/77/EC  [2010] OJ L 311/84.

[3] The Commission in its report, p.12 pointed to the need to increase the number and quality of the peer reviews as these are effective instruments to identify differences in implementation and interpretation.

[4] See the German and Dutch cases, mentioned in Wymeersch, in: Belcredi and Ferrarini (Eds) Boards and Shareholders in European Listed companies, 2014.

[5]  See e.g. in the short selling field: ECJ, Case C-270/12 ECJ, 7 March 2014, or on securities settlement: ECJ, 5 March 2015, case t-496/11 United Kingdom v. ECB

[6] These are Norway, Iceland, Liechtenstein. In addition, the Swiss regulation very often follows the lines adopted in the EU regulations.

[7] Council Regulation (EU) No 1024/2013 of 15 October 2013 conferring specific tasks on the European Central Bank concerning policies relating to the prudential supervision of credit institutions, OJEU, 29 October2013, L 287/63 (SSMReg)

[7] Regulation (EU) No 806/2014 of 15 July 2014 establishing uniform rules and a uniform procedure for the resolution of credit institutions and certain investment firms in the framework of a Single Resolution Mechanism and a Single Resolution Fund and amending Regulation (EU) No 1093/2010. OJEU, 30 July 2014, L.225/1 (SRM)

[8]  See article 4(3)SSM Reg

[9] See Regulation (EU) 2016/445 of the ECB of 14 March 2016 on the exercise of options and discretions available in Union law (ECB/2016/4), OJ L 78, 24.3.2016, p. 60.

[10] See recital 34, SSM Reg

[11]  Except where otherwise provided: e.g. article 25(5) SSM Reg

[12] See European Parliament: Public Hearing on Financial Supervision in the EU:  Implications of the SSM on the ESFS, Vítor Constâncio, 24 May 2013, ECB, Speeches.

[13] The “ECB shall be considered, as appropriate, the competent authority or the designated authority in the participating Member States as established by the relevant Union law”, article 9(1), SSM Reg.

[14] Directive 2014/59/EU of 15 May 2014 establishing a framework for the recovery and resolution of credit institutions and investment firms and amending Council Directive 82/891/EEC, and Directives 2001/24/EC, 2002/47/EC, 2004/25/EC, 2005/56/EC, 2007/36/EC, 2011/35/EU, 2012/30/EU and 2013/36/EU, and Regulations (EU) No 1093/2010 and (EU) No 648/2012, of the European Parliament and of the Council, OJEU, 12 June 2014, L 173/90

[15]  Article 5(1) SRM Reg

[16] See article 5(2) SRM Reg

[17]  See article 32(2) SRM Reg where the preponderant position of the Single Resolution Board is affirmed.

[18] See Commission: The review of the Directive 2002/87/EC of the European Parliament and the Council on the supplementary supervision of credit institutions, insurance undertakings and investment firms in a financial conglomerate  20 December .2012 COM(2012) 785 final . Although a fundamental revision of the directives was planned, the double regime still remains in place.

[19] See http://www.eba.europa.eu/documents/10180/15736/JC+2015+055+Joint+Committee+Work+Programme+2016.pdf. In this context the commission report also called for more and better peer reviews.

[20] ESAs letter to European Commission on cross-selling of financial products,2016/07 of 26 January 2016; ESAa 2017- 070.uropean Financial Regulation: how to make it more workable.n both field initaiives haev eraction with the national ones. The se

[21] No mention is made of the situation in which the ECB is acting as supervisor of a conglomerate, hence dealing with insurance supervision although the latter is not included in its Treat based mandate.

[22] Searching for Group of companies 34010 documents were listed.

[23] See the Refit initiative, Commission decision, of 19.5.2015 establishing the REFIT (Regulatory Fitness and Performance Platform)  C (2015)3261 final

[24]Lamfalussy report : The Committee of Wise Men on the Regulation of European Securities Markets, 15 February 2001.

[25] See http://www.legislation.gov.uk, under Companies Act 2006

[26] https://www.legifrance.gouv.fr/affichCode.do?cidTexte=LEGITEXT000006072026

[27]  See e.g., Regulation 1022/ 2013, of 22 October 2013, on the EBA.

[28] See D. Nouy, Tommaso Padoa-Schioppa Memorial Lecture, https://www.ecb.europa.eu/press/key/date/2014/html/sp140709_2.en.html

[29] https://www.google.com/search?q=Esma+single+rulebook&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8

[30] See Pproposal for a regulation laying down common rules on securitisation and creating a European framework for simple, transparent and standardised securitisation and amending Directives 2009/65/EC, 2009/138/EC, 2011/61/EU and Regulations (EC) No 1060/2009 and (EU) No 648/2012, COM/2015/0472 final – http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:52015PC0472

[31] http://ec.europa.eu/finance/consultations/2015/financial-regulatory-framework-review/docs/consultation-document_en.pdf, 30 September 2015; see KPMG, The cumulative impact of regulation,  June 2013, dealing explicitly with the Belgian banking sector, https://www.kpmg.com/BE/en/IssuesAndInsights/ArticlesPublications/Documents/The-impact-of-regulation-revised.pdf; AFME, Call for evidence on cumulative impact of regulation Supplementary evidence note , January 2016 , https://www.google.es/search?q=cumulative+impact+of+regulation&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8&gws_rd=cr&ei=unQkV8GPG8SqUZOYotgG

[32] Interactions, inconsistencies and gaps and unintended consequences are explicitly mentioned.