On January 27, 2015, a letter from the Chair of the Supervisory Board ("the Board") of the Single Supervisory Mechanism ("SSM") at the European Central Bank ("ECB"), addressed to the management of significant banks, discussing the practices that apply in the new supervisory setting of the SSM was published by the ECB. The ECB assumed its new prudential supervisory role for banks in the Eurozone under the SSM in November 2014. The SSM creates a new system of financial supervision, under which the ECB directly supervises 120 significant banking groups, and sets and monitors supervisory standards for other Eurozone banks by working more closely with national regulators. The letter states that written clarification has been requested by banks on the processes and practices that apply within the new supervisory framework. The Board recognizes that a broad variety of practices relating to the supervision of significant banks exist across member states, and confirms that the existing process under the SSM Regulation will apply until further notice. In the meantime, the ECB will proactively assess the merits of various other approaches.
The ECB letter is available at: https://www.bankingsupervision.europa.eu/banking/letterstobanks/shared/pdf/2015/150127letter_supervision_processes.en.pdf?ce996ad57ed2d71ca5487b2e8b12524a .
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