The European Commission (Commission) has published a communication on completing the Banking Union.

The communication takes stock of what has been achieved in creating the Banking Union and what measures are still needed to complete it. It urges the European Parliament and the Council to progress quickly in the adoption of measures to tackle remaining risks in the banking sector and suggests new actions to reduce non-performing loans and to help banks diversify their investment in sovereign bonds.

The communication also aims to give new impetus to the negotiations on a common European Deposit Insurance Scheme (EDIS) by offering possible compromise ideas for issues where no agreement could be reached yet. It also maps out the path towards the setting up of the backstop for the Single Resolution Fund.

The communication also notes that, as mentioned in the Capital Markets Union Mid-term Review, the Commission will also propose in December 2017 that large investment firms carrying out bank-like activities be considered credit institutions and be subject to bank supervision. In the Banking Union they would be supervised in the framework of the Single Supervisory Mechanism, including by the European Central Bank. This will ensure that prudential rules are applied consistently and that both large investment firms and credit institutions are subject to the same high level standards of supervision.

View European Commission communication on completing the Banking Union, 11 October 2017

View Commission calls for the completion of all parts of the Banking Union by 2018, 11 October 2017