Brussels, 04/02/2008 (Agence Europe) - Charlie McCreevy, European Commissioner for the internal market, and Chistopher Cox, President of the American Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), agreed that 2008 will see them step up work leading to the mutual recognition of American and European legislation governing the securities markets, at a meeting held on Friday 1 February as part of Mr McCreevy's visit to Washington. This mutual recognition, which will govern the existence of comparable rules on both sides of the Atlantic on the functioning and control of the markets, will, amongst other things, allow the American stock markets to authorise direct access to their markets for European investors using European financial intermediaries, and vice versa.
“The US and the EU, which comprise 70% of the world's capital markets, have a common interest in developing a cooperative approach to reducing regulatory friction and increasing investor access to investment diversification opportunities and enhancing investor protections. The concept of mutual recognition offers significant promise as a means of better protecting investors, fostering capital formation and maintaining fair, orderly, and efficient transatlantic securities markets”, Mr McCreevy and Mr Cox stated in a joint press release. They went on to call on the industry to give its point of view on this issue. The SEC and the European Commission, supported by the Committee of European Securities Regulators (CESR), will try to define a joint regulatory framework prior to mutual recognition. Amongst the other subjects on the agenda of the meeting were financial turbulence, financial ratings agencies, state investment funds and accounting standards.
Mr McCreevy also heavily criticised the American insurance system, the regulation of which is set at federal state level. This situation works against European insurers wishing to establish themselves on the American market. “I have to say that our experience over the past couple of years in dealing with the current state-based insurance system in the US has not been encouraging. In fact it has been desperately disappointing to see the United States so protectionist at (federal) state level. Whilst there are many insurance regulators in this country who recognise that change is required and that the US needs to engage effectively internationally, the system for getting standards agreed and adopted in the US as a whole currently remains unsatisfactory”, the Commissioner told the National Press Club in Washington on the same day. (M.B.)