European Union finance ministers meeting in Luxembourg reached a political agreement on Friday 9 October to overhaul supervision of the bloc’s financial markets, giving the European Securities and Markets Authority greater authority while limiting how far oversight will shift from national regulators. Most ministers supported the EU Council’s position on the Market Integration and Supervision Package, agreed under Ireland’s rotating EU presidency.
The deal leaves Deutsche Börse outside European-level supervision for the time being, after Germany refused to support the Commission’s original plan unless the exchange remained under German supervision.
The European Commission had proposed in December 2025 that all stock exchanges, large central counterparties and central securities depositories should come under ESMA rather than national authorities.
The agreed version introduces trading thresholds and geographic-footprint tests that allow Deutsche Börse’s nationally focused trading venues to avoid ESMA oversight. The number of trading-venue operators under the authority’s direct supervision will therefore fall from 12 to 8.
The retrenchment also affects market infrastructure beyond exchanges. Three of the original nine central counterparties, CBOE Clear in the Netherlands, BME in Spain and Nasdaq Clearing in Sweden, have been removed from ESMA’s jurisdiction. The initial group of 15 central securities depositories has been cut to 13, excluding Spain’s Iberclear and the Baltic Nasdaq CSD.
Maria Luís Albuquerque, the European Commissioner for Financial Services and the Savings and Investments Union, expressed disappointment, saying the package fell significantly short of the Commission’s intended ambition. She said the compromise had taken four trading-venue groups, three central counterparties and two central securities depositories out of ESMA supervision compared with the original proposal.
The Commission said the agreed approach does not give ESMA the autonomy required for effective supervision. European Central Bank President Christine Lagarde shared the Commission’s dissatisfaction with the provisions on the authority’s independence and the centralisation of oversight.
France had pressed before the meeting for stronger executive powers for the regulator. Paris also opposed a provision under which nine national supervisory authorities could seek further consideration of draft decisions by ESMA’s executive board.
The Irish presidency rewrote the disputed language to restrict the ability to hold up decisions while retaining ESMA’s power to act during emergencies.
Simon Harris, Ireland’s Minister for Finance and the lead negotiator under the rotating presidency, said the legal text would now be finalised and formally adopted at a forthcoming Council meeting.
Giancarlo Giorgetti, Italy’s Minister for the Economy, described agreement among 27 countries as a major political success. Carlo Comporti, an Italian appointee and ESMA’s new chair, will lead the authority as it takes on its expanded, though constrained, supervisory role.
Belgium abstained from the vote, while Denmark accepted the compromise reluctantly. Belgium’s finance minister, Jan Jambon, warned that the exemptions would fragment the EU market and distort competition, and said that concern led his country to withhold support.
The package changes 18 pieces of legislation. Its purpose is to integrate the EU’s financial markets and strengthen their oversight, at a time when market fragmentation is described as a major obstacle to the bloc’s economic recovery.
Comments (0)