On 5th May 2015, the Luxembourg Bankers’ Association (ABBL) jointly with the Luxembourg Stock Exchange (LuxSE) organised a conference for the local financial community on the EU Commission Capital Markets Union (CMU) initiative.
CMU is the EU Commission's strategic plan aimed at improving access to financing for all businesses across Europe, increasing and diversifying sources of funding from investors and making the markets work more efficiently and effectively both within Member States and cross-border by 2019.
CMU regulatory progress goes along with the financing package for growth and jobs run jointly with the European Investment Bank. Its general timeline is expected to take place as follows:
- closing of the consultation period by 13 May
- organisation of an EU-led EU Commission event around summer
- presentation of an action plan and specific implementing measures (namely in relation to the prospectus directive and securitisation)
The conference was organised at the LuxSE’s premises attracting some 80 decision-makers from the local financial sector.
The speakers outlined the current state of play of the Commission's Green Paper and intended goals, presented by Alexis Marchand from the EU Commission. It triggered a debate between Daniele De Gennaro (European Banking Federation) and Bob Kneip (Kneip), the latter as a Luxembourg-based representative of corporate capital raising aspects. Hubert Grignon-Dumoulin (LuxSE), Rodolphe de Pierpont (Febelfin - Belgian Banking and Financial Association) and Nathalie Dogniez (PwC) further debated their views on the banking, financial markets and investment funds perspective, offering concrete advice to participants and anticipating relevant solutions to likely issues.
The ABBL believes that the consultation launched by the EU Commission is an opportunity to look back at the measures which have been adopted over the past few years with the political aim to ensure stability of the financial sector and the economy at large and to check the proportionality of certain of these measures as well as their cumulative impact on growth. To develop a regulatory agenda to stimulate growth of the EU economy it is important to create a positive business mindset.
Both ABBL and LuxSE strongly believe that CMU shall be taken as a positive challenge for financial sector operators, among which banks, to strategically redefine their core services at level playing field.