ARTICLE
16 October 2024

Looking Ahead: European Developments - Horizon Scanner: Finance, October 2024

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Arthur Cox

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Arthur Cox is one of Ireland’s leading law firms. For almost 100 years, we have been at the forefront of developments in the legal profession in Ireland. Our practice encompasses all aspects of corporate and business law. The firm has offices in Dublin, Belfast, London, New York and Silicon Valley.
The consultation by the European Central Bank (ECB) on its new draft Guide on governance and risk culture closes on 16 October 2024.
European Union Finance and Banking

BANKS - GOVERNANCE AND RISK CULTURE

The consultation by the European Central Bank (ECB) on its new draft Guide on governance and risk culture closes on 16 October 2024. The new guide would replace the ECB's 2016 SSM supervisory statement on governance and risk appetite, and aims to give banks a roadmap to a more effective internal governance and risk culture. It sets out expectations regarding how management bodies and committees should be composed and function, sets out the roles and responsibilities of the internal control functions, emphasises the importance of risk culture and outlines expectations regarding banks' risk appetite frameworks.

BANKS – INTERNAL MODELS

The consultation paper from the European Banking Authority (EBA) amending the implementing technical standards (ITS) on the joint decision process for internal model authorisation under the Capital Requirements Regulation (CRR) closes for feedback on 16 October 2024. The revised ITS are part of the first phase of the EBA roadmap for implementing the EU Banking Package.

BANKS - RESOLUTION

The EBA's public consultation on draft ITS which would overhaul its resolution planning reporting framework closes on 30 October 2024.

Announced on 30 July 2024, the draft ITS are designed to ensure that resolution authorities have the data they need with a view to improving the usability of the reporting framework and enhancing a consistent monitoring of resolution planning. The EBA is proposing that the submission deadline for reporting be brought forward from 30 April to 31 March, that there would be an extension of the scope of entities for which data is collected, and that there would be an expansion of the information requested on some topics, in particular organisational structure, granular liability data, critical functions, financial markets infrastructures data, critical services and critical information systems.

After the consultation period ends, the EBA plans to submit the final draft ITS to the European Commission by March 2025.

BANKS – SECURITIES FINANCING TRANSACTIONS

The EBA's consultation on draft regulatory technical standards (RTS) specifying the conditions and the criteria to assess whether the credit valuation adjustment (CVA) risk exposures arising from fair-valued securities financing transactions (SFTs) are material, as well as the frequency of that assessment, closes on 8 October 2024. The consultation was launched on 8 July 2024.

The draft RTS suggest a quantitative threshold approach to determining the materiality of CVA risk exposures arising from fair-valued SFTs. The draft RTS set out a ratio that quantifies the amount of CVA risk arising from fair-valued SFTs relative to the CVA risk of transactions within the scope of own funds requirements for CVA risk. The draft RTS propose that the assessment take place on a quarterly basis.

BANKS – SOUND MANAGEMENT OF THIRD-PARTY RISK

The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision's consultation on principles for the sound management of third-party risk in the banking sector closes on 9 October 2024. The principles aim to address the increasing reliance by banks on third-party service providers in light of ongoing digitalisation and the rapid growth in FinTech. The principles are intended to replace the principles in the 2005 Joint Forum Paper on outsourcing in financial services as they relate to the banking sector.

ESMA - REPORTING REQUIREMENTS AND GOVERNANCE EXPECTATIONS FOR SOME SUPERVISED ENTITIES

ESMA's July 2024 consultations on proposed guidance for some of its supervised entities close for feedback on 18 October 2024. The consultations are aimed at benchmark administrators, credit rating agencies, securitisation repositories under the EU Securitisation Regulation, trade repositories under EMIR/SFTR, and data reporting service providers under MiFIR.

The Consultation Paper for Guidelines on the submission of periodic information to ESMA sets out the information that ESMA expects to receive and a timeline for supervised entities to provide the required information. The Consultation Paper for Guidelines on supervisory expectations for the management body sets out ESMA's supervisory expectations in relation to good practice in governance arrangements, such as on the role, operation, and effectiveness of the management bodies of the entities supervised by ESMA. The proposed guidance is also aimed at future supervised entities. This consultation paper also seeks input feedback from systemically important third country central counterparties. ESMA plans to publish a final report in Q1 2025.

INSURANCE – EIOPA CONSULTATIONS

EIOPA's public consultation on the future implementation of the new proportionality framework under Solvency II closes on 25 October 2024. The consultation covers the methodology for classifying insurance undertakings as small and non-complex (who would benefit from proportionality measures) and the conditions for granting similar proportionality measures to insurers that don't by default fall into the small and non-complex category. EIOPA plans to submit its final advice to the Commission by 31 January 2025.

EIOPA's consultation (in response to a request for technical advice from the Commission) on the capital requirement treatment of insurers' direct exposures to qualified central counterparties (CCPs) within the standard formula closes on 23 October 2024. The consultation notes that EEA (re)insurers have (until recently) only used central clearing facilities indirectly as clients for their derivatives transactions. While Solvency II prescribes a specific treatment for those indirect arrangements, direct exposures to CCPs haven't been accounted for and as a result would be treated as bilateral exposure, resulting in higher capital requirements. While EIOPA isn't aware of any EEA (re)insurers with traditional direct exposures to CCPs (as this may fall foul of national laws in some cases), clearing houses' access models have evolved and EIOPA's consultation looks at those access models and their implications on the risk exposures, liquidity needs and risk assessment calculations of (re)insurers and proposes various policy options. EIOPA plans to submit the final advice to the Commission by 31 January 2025.

INSURANCE – IAIS CONSULTATIONS

The consultation by the International Association of Insurance Supervisors (IAIS) on a draft application paper on operational resilience objectives (which wouldn't impose new requirements, but instead aims to clarify the application of existing supervisory materials) closes on 11 October 2024. The IAIS signalled that this is the first phase of a two-part consultation. The second phase will involve the development of a draft toolkit to support the objectives by setting out relevant supervisory practices and will be the subject of a consultation in H1 2025. Once that's complete, both phases will be integrated into a single application paper.

The IAIS has extended the deadline for responses to its fourth consultation on climate risk supervisory guidance to 28 October 2024.

INSURANCE – PROFESSIONAL INDEMNITY INSURANCE

Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2024/896 applies from 9 October 2024. It contains RTS under the Insurance Distribution Directive amending the base euro amounts for professional indemnity insurance and for financial capacity of insurance and reinsurance intermediaries.

See the 'Irish Developments' section of this Horizon Scanner: Finance for details of related Irish

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