On Wednesday 9 September, the Board of Supervisors (BoS) of the European Banking Authority (EBA), which brings together the banking supervisors of all 28 EU Member States, confirmed the extension of the mandates of Andrea Enria and Adam Farkas. Mr. Enria and Mr. Farkas act respectively as Chairperson and Executive Director of the EBA. The appointment extends their initial 5 year term by another 5 years – from 2016 to 2021.

Mr. Enria and Mr. Farkas are the first to be appointed in what will be a series of (re-)appointments to the European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) this year. The Board of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) will convene on 24 September and is likely to reappoint Steven Maijoor, its current Chair. Verena Ross, ESMA’s Executive Director, has made no public statements yet on whether she is interested in extending her term.

For EIOPA, the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority, Mr. Gabriel Bernardino is likely to stay on too. He is expected to be reappointed by the EIOPA Board of Supervisors at their meeting on 30 September. His Executive Director, Carlos Montalvo, will be leaving for an industry position in April 2016. EIOPA will start looking for his successor this October.

Mr. Enria’s appointment, like all appointments of the Chairpersons of the ESAs, needs to be confirmed by the European Parliament (EP). Once an ESA Board of Supervisors has made a decision on such an appointment, the EP has one month to confirm or reject the candidate.

While this may seem like a technicality, the relationship between the ESAs and the EP has not been particularly amicable of late. Especially the lack of information by ESMA on its drafting of the MiFID II Regulatory Technical Standards did not go down well with the members of the EP’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee.

That point is likely to be made again on Monday, when the EP holds its annual hearing with all three Chairs of the ESAs. This is a process different from the EP’s sign-off on the Chairs, but will give us an indication of whether the EP wants to make the appointments political. The EP being the EP, it might do just that and use the appointments to bargain for more involvement in the ESA’s drafting of level 2 measures. To be continued!