The President of the Spanish Banking Association, José María Roldán, today highlighted the need to harmonize accounting standards among banking entities subject to direct supervision by the Single Supervisory Mechanism and those that will be supervised by the ECB, but through the National Competent Authorities.
During his address at the 17th Euro Finance Week, held in Frankfurt under the title “The Single Supervisory Mechanism,” the AEB President emphasized the importance of accounting aspects, which he described as “a real elephant in the room.” “Accounting is the fabric from which banking solvency is made. We must ask ourselves if entities subject to International Financial Reporting Standards and others subject to national accounting standards can coexist in the medium term,” José María Roldán stated.
The AEB President expressed, in particular, his concern about the introduction of expected loss-based provisions in IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards), since, in his opinion, this fact will further increase the distance between the standards applied to each of these two groups of entities in an area that is crucial for solvency supervision.
José María Roldán’s address at the 17th Euro Finance Week focused on the challenges faced by less significant institutions in the eurozone, i.e., those that will be supervised by the ECB but through the National Competent Authorities, such as the Bank of Spain in our country. Among the difficulties he referred to were operational challenges, such as the low interest rate environment or the weak demand for credit; structural challenges, highlighting overbanking in Europe; and finally, those derived from the regulatory process undertaken in recent years. In this regard, he cited the launch of the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) and the need to adapt to new regulations, such as Basel III and the Resolution Directive.
“Europe has decided to implement a single supervision system in the eurozone, under the umbrella of the ECB. We would make a mistake if we underestimated the importance of indirect supervision of less significant entities, since, although supervision remains with national authorities, it is carried out applying the new supervision manual for the eurozone and under the responsibility of the ECB,” concluded the AEB President.
The 17th Euro Finance Week, held in Frankfurt from November 17 to 21, under the patronage of German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schäuble, features the participation of authorities and representatives at the highest level of the European banking industry. These include Giacomo Caviglia (Directorate General Micro-Prudential Supervision III, European Central Bank), Christian Clausen (President, European Banking Federation), Dr. Andreas Dombret (Member of the Executive Board, Deutsche Bundesbank), Dr. Klaus Düllmann (Directorate General Micro-Prudential Supervision IV, European Central Bank), Andrea Enria (Chairperson, European Banking Authority – EBA), Adam Farkas (Executive Director, European Banking Authority), Dr. Thomas Gstädtner (Directorate General Micro-Prudential Supervision II, European Central Bank), Patrick Hoedjes (Head of Oversight and Operations, EIOPA), Dr. Elke König (President, Federal Financial Supervisory Authority – BaFin), Sabine Lautenschläger (Member of the Executive Board and Vice-Chair of the Supervisory Board of the Single Supervisory Mechanism, European Central Bank), Wim Mijs (Chief Executive, European Banking Federation), José María Roldán (Chairman & CEO, Spanish Banking Association), Dr. Johannes Turner (Director, Österreichische Nationalbank), among others.
For more information:
http://www.eurofinanceweek.com/images/programm/Gesamtprogramm_2014.pdf
