On Tuesday 8 April, members of the European Parliament’s Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON) and Environment, Climate and Food Safety (ENVI) committees asked Maria Luís Albuquerque, European Commissioner for Financial Services, for explanations on the revision of the taxonomy.
Included in the ‘omnibus’ simplification package (see EUROPE 13588/4), this revision is still being drawn up. Ms Albuquerque indicated that amendments to the delegated acts will be presented at the end of June to ensure that companies benefit from these measures for their next reporting cycle, in January 2026. The public consultation, which closed at the end of March, received around 360 responses. The Commission has also consulted the Platform on Sustainable Finance and the group of Member State experts, and “they are largely supportive of the measures proposed”, the Commissioner emphasised.
MEPs asked her about materiality, as the Commission plans to reduce reporting models by around 70%. This would allow companies to focus on their core activities, thanks to a materiality threshold of 10% in general and a materiality threshold of 25% for operating expenses (OPEX), “which would allow banks and other financial institutions to report only on the financing of their counterparties subject to the obligation”, the Commissioner explained in detail.
For Janusz Lewandowski (EPP, Polish), the definition of capital expenditure (CAPEX) and OPEX lacks clarity. “In addition to the materiality threshold in OPEX, we will have to think about how to better define relevant expenditures and also how to ensure that this expenditure complies with accounting standards”, replied the representative of the Directorate General for Financial Stability (DG FISMA).
For her part, Lara Wolters (S&D, Dutch) regretted that the 10% threshold chosen was “the most permissive of all the options considered by the Platform on Sustainable Finance, which recommended a range of between 2 and 10%”. She also felt that the double threshold structure added unnecessary complexity. “The double threshold is because operating expenditure is not as relevant for this for this context” replied Ms Albuquerque. (Original version in French by Anne Damiani)