The European Parliament and Council last night reached an agreement on revising the EU’s prudential rules for insurers (the Solvency II Directive). The Greens criticised the outcome for falling short in key areas aimed at protecting policy holders. Commenting on the outcome, Green finance spokesperson Sven Giegold said: “The EU has missed an opportunity to […]
EU insurance rules (Solvency II)
Green Guide to the “Information Note” of EIOPA
EIOPA’s note includes essential information about the impact of the latest Council position on the long term guarantee (LTG) measures. 1. The most important results are set out in Appendix 1. The appendix presents results for four scenarios. Most relevant are the first scenario (EIOPA report OF 20%) which shows the impact of EIOPA’s recommendation […]
Solvency II: Insurance lobby celebrates a landslide victory over consumer protection
Greens will name and shame profiting companies Tonight European Parliament (EP), Council and European Commission agreed on a compromise on changes to the prudential rules for insurers (the “Solvency II Directive”). Solvency II replaced, in 2009, Solvency I (from 1973) that regulators and industry analysts alike agreed did not capture fully and consistently the risks […]
European Social Fund: A success for the solidary economy
During the negotiations between European Parliament, Council and Commission concerning the European Social Fund, we achieved a double success, strenghthening the social and solidarity economy. The term “social and solidarity economy” is now included into a European legislative text for the first time. Furthermore, the framework regulation on the European Social Fund opens the door […]
Report of the European Parliament about the Troika’s work
The coordinators of the political groups in the economic and financial affairs committee of the European Parliament have decided to draft a report about the work of the Troika in Greece, Portugal, Ireland and Cyprus. During the past month I worked hard to achieve this agreement and I am glad that the work will start […]
Financial market manipulation: Commission bows to London and gives up on European supervision of benchmarks
The European Commission today presented a legislative proposal on benchmarks used for commodities, interbank lending and exchange rates. The proposal is ostensibly aimed at addressing flaws in the current rules, which allowed the LIBOR and EURIBOR scandals to occur, however the Greens have expressed concern that the draft legislation will fail to deliver on this […]