On Wednesday 21 February, the committee on economic and monetary affairs of the European Parliament approved, by 41 votes to six with five abstentions, the appointment of Slovenia's Boštjan Jazbec to the post of director of resolution planning and decisions of the Single Resolution Board (SRB) for five years, as proposed by the European Commission last week (see EUROPE 11961).
On Tuesday, the Slovenian investor association VZMD, a member of the organisation BETTER FINANCE, said that Jazbec's involvement, as governor of the Bank of Slovenia, in the “institutional robbery of the century” was incompatible with his nomination to the SRB. The association was referring to the series of bailouts concerning five Slovenian banks in late 2013 (see EUROPE 10983), during which holders of so-called subordinate receivables suffered losses in the region of €400 million.
“At the SRB, Jazbec will now be responsible for the development of the bail-in option, an area in which he certainly has a proven track record, but a very controversial one indeed”, the association regret in a press release.
At the candidate's hearing preceding Parliament's vote, these matters were not discussed. Instead, the MEPs asked him about the lessons to be learnt from the bailout case concerning the Spanish bank Banco Popular or the practical consequences that Brexit may have on the EU resolution framework. (Original version in French by Marion Fontana)