Productos o resultados

The Economic and Financial Affairs Council (ECOFIN) (2000) concludes during a meeting in 2000 that the euro and the resulting structural changes have fastened the integration of financial markets in the European Union, the ministers of finance and economic affairs wondered whether the regulation needed to be updated. ECOFIN (2000) set up the so-called Committee of Wise Men under the leadership of Lamfalussy who was asked to find ways to more effectively regulate: the conduct of cross-border financial operations, the day-to-day operation of the regulated markets, the protection of consumers, the integrity of the market and other areas of regulation. The mandate of the Committee (Lamfalussy et al., 2000, p. 30) was threefold:

“to assess the current conditions for implementation of the regulation of the securities markets in the European Union; to assess how the mechanism for regulating the securities markets in the European Union can best respond to developments underway on securities markets, and to propose as a result scenarios for adapting current practices to ensure greater convergence and cooperation in day to day implementation, taking into account new developments in the market.”

In 2001 Lamfalussy et al. (2001) presented the final version of his report, the main conclusion was that the EU legislative process on regulation was too slow, the average co-decision procedure took over two years. It took for example 4 years to implement Basel I. The Expert Group on Banking (2004) warned that the 10 new Member States that were going to join the European Union in May 2004 would make the legislative process not going faster and warned for potential diverging and conflicting application of the regulation. The Committee considers this to be a problem as the pace of market change is accelerating due to globalization, deregulation and information technology.

The solution would be a regulatory decision-making reform, the Committee proposes a four- level approach, level 1 the European Commission sets the framework principles for new regulations and directives, level 2 two new Committees (EU Securities Committee and EU Securities Regulators Committee), help the European Commission with technical advice on how to implement the framework principles and the European Parliament gives its position about the proposal to the European Commission, level 3 national securities regulators vote about the proposal, and level 4 is about strengthening the enforcement of regulation by all parties but in particular by the European Commission as guardian of the European treaties. The Committee (2001) noticed that when this new four-level approach would not work, which is reflected in the Monitoring Group’s half-yearly reports, then the Committee would propose a Treaty change to establish a single EU regulatory authority for financial services. Quickly after the publication of the report, the proposal to create a four-level approach was approved by ECOFIN (2001b), and they made a resolution on the functioning of a new legislative process for EU securities markets. In June 2001 the European Commission established the Committee of European Securities Regulators (CESR) and the European Securities Committee (ESC) by adopting Decision Decisions 2001/ 527/EC and 2001/528/EC. CESR was, according to Article 3, composed of high-level national representatives of public authorities and a high-level representative of the European Commission. The ESC was, according to Article 3, composed as well of both high-level representatives, the chairmen of CESR participated at the meetings as an observer.

Although the report of Lamfalussy was focused on securities markets in the European Union, in December 2002 ECOFIN (2002) decided to apply the Lamfalussy process to all financial sectors (banking, insurance, and occupational pensions) in the European Union and asked the European Commission to establish similar institutions for the banking and pension sector. The European Commission established in November 2003 so-called Level 3 Committees existing of the Committee of European Banking Supervisors (CEBS) (Decision 2004/5/EC), the Committee of European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Supervisors (CEIOPS) (Decision 2004/6/EC), and the before-mentioned CESR. The tasks of the CEBS are mentioned in recital 4, 5 and 6, it should advise the European Commission, contribute to the consistent and timely application of Community legislation, and should promote cooperation in the banking field and work together with Banking Supervision Committee of the European System of Central Banks and with the Groupe de Contact of European banking supervisors.

After the aforementioned reforms, the European Commission wanted a break. During a speech by McCreevy (2005), the former European Commissioner for Internal Market and Services, to the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee of the European Parliament in February 2005 about the Governance and Accountability in Financial Services, McCreevy recognized that there was “real regulatory fatigue”. McCreevy announced that he wouldn’t introduce new legislative proposals but rather implement the FSAP. This position was a bit surprising as Alford (2006) claimed that possibly the political climate was not supportive of major changes, the financial industry supported generally consolidating existing financial services legislation and coordinating supervisory practice between the Member States of the European Union. Meanwhile, Schüler (2003) claimed that the systemic risk potential in the European banking market has increased and believes that this threat can’t be dealt with at the national level. The following important report was the De Larossière report.