41 Amendments of Fabio DE MASI related to 2015/2221(INI)
Amendment 27 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital B
Recital B
B. whereas the BU is instrumental to ensuring stability and restoring confidence in euro area banks, enhancing financial integration, fostering risk sharing within the monetary union and contributing to breaking the link between sovereigns and banks at national level in order to avoid a socialisation of private debt by financial institutions;
Amendment 36 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital D
Recital D
D. whereas the SSM is the first pillar of the BU and should aims to ensure a uniform and homogeneous supervision of euro area banks, createtaking into account the uneven framework of the European construction derived from the international division of labour between core and peripheral regions, creating a level playing field in the banking market, and contributeing to the safety and soundness of credit institutions and the stability of the financial system;
Amendment 44 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital E
Recital E
E. whereas the SRM is the second pillar of the BU and should aims to ensure uniform rules and procedures and a common decision- making process for orderly resolution of failing banks with minimum impact on the real economy and public finance throughout Europe;
Amendment 57 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital F a (new)
Recital F a (new)
Fa. whereas the current economic crisis was largely caused by the financial industry where many actors have become too-big and too-interconnected-to fail and had to be bailed-out with public funds; in contrast to any market-economy logic, losses were socialised and profits privatised; not only did this send national economies spiralling downwards and set off a public debt crisis, it also led to a regime of harsh austerity policies, imposed by EU institutions and the IMF as conditions for loans;
Amendment 58 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital F b (new)
Recital F b (new)
Fb. whereas the key role of financial institutions is to channel savings into productive investments and to guarantee the socioeconomic function of credit, the invention of various toxic financial instruments and dubious business practices - which for example set exorbitantly high profit targets - has increased volatility and short-term orientation on the financial markets with negative effects on societies and economies; it is therefore imperative to shrink the financial sector to its core functions; hence, institutions that have reached a size and level of interconnectedness which is likely to pose a systemic threat to the functioning of the economies of single Member States or the Union as a whole should be downsized and separated;
Amendment 59 #
Motion for a resolution
Recital F c (new)
Recital F c (new)
Fc. whereas a proper Structural Reform of Banks which separates trading activities from retail banking and downsizes banks is key to the resolvability of banks and hence the credibility and efficiency of the BU;
Amendment 60 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1
Paragraph 1
Amendment 67 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 a (new)
Paragraph 1 a (new)
1a. Welcomes the attempt to put in place a European banking supervisory mechanism while being concerned about the conflict of interest entailed in the ECB being a supervisor and a lender of last resort;
Amendment 70 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 1 b (new)
Paragraph 1 b (new)
1b. Points out that the establishment of the SSM is much too recent and does not allow for a full evaluation both from an operational point of view and in terms of supervisory quality;
Amendment 74 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 2 – point a
Paragraph 2 – point a
(a) the recruitment process, which resulted in a good blend of competences, cultures and gender, thus contributing to the supranational nature of the SSM, and the thorough training activity programme for national competent authorities (NCAs) and ECB staff; regrets, however, that the professional background of the recruited staff gives rise to conflict of interest in terms of prior service to financial industry;
Amendment 91 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3 a (new)
Paragraph 3 a (new)
3a. Notes with satisfaction that the ethics rules of the ECB have been reviewed but underlines the need for further development in the light of the expanded mandate of the ECB which requires stronger rules on conflict of interests and safeguards against undue influence of financial industry on staff as well as members of the governing bodies;
Amendment 92 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 3 b (new)
Paragraph 3 b (new)
3b. Demands that the President of the European Central Bank immediately steps down from his seat in the Group of Thirty (G30); believes that the ECB President, Mario Draghi, is guilty of conflict of interest as his role as supervisor of all large banks in the Eurozone is incompatible with his association with private market players;
Amendment 96 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 6
Paragraph 6
6. Emphasises the need to avoid double reporting requirements and more generally an unnecessary administrative burden on credit institutions, in particular smaller banks;
Amendment 122 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 9
Paragraph 9
9. Underlines that economic recovery is underway but is still fragile and modest, inflation remains below its target, credit dynamics are still subdued in many jurisdictions and a large stock of non- performing loans weighs on many European banks’ balance sheets, limiting their capacity to finance the economy;
Amendment 139 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 11
Paragraph 11
11. Believes that the worldwide drive towards more and better quality bank capital is a necessary condition for a sound banking system capable of supporting the economy and for avoiding any repeat of the enormous bailouts witnessed during the crisis; considers therefore the Commission's proposal for a Capital Market Union and its attempt to revitalize securitization to be counterproductive as contributing to greater systemic risk and volatility in financing conditions;
Amendment 151 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 12
Paragraph 12
12. Notes that an increase in capital requirements, beyond a certain threshold, may in the short term induce banks tousterity policies which hamper investment and credit demand as well as a lack of capital and non- performing loans weighing on banks’ balance sheets may curtail the supply of credit, and therefore looks forward to an end of austerity policies and the overall stabilisation of the level of capital;
Amendment 179 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 17
Paragraph 17
17. Stresses the importance of the work that has been undertaken on the homogenisation of the calculation of risk- weighted assets, which is pivotal for comparability purposes, and on the review of internal models for the calculation of banks’ capital requirements, and considers progress in this area, for all portfolios, crucial in order to preserve the effectiveness and credibility of banking supervision in the euro area; calls for regular evaluations of the application of the capital requirements in order to avoid loopholes in the calculation of risk- weighted assets;
Amendment 187 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 19
Paragraph 19
19. Considers that appropriatmore attention should be paid to increased exposure in the form of off-balance sheet items, in particular for global systematically important banks (G- SIBs);
Amendment 191 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 20
Paragraph 20
20. Underlines the important role played by the SSM during the Greek crisis in monitoring the condition of the country’s banking sector, in conducting a comprehensive assessment of the significant Greek institutions and in contributing to the determination of the recapitalisation needs; condemns the SSM decision to limit Greek banks' exposure to Greek sovereign debt, thus increasing the danger of state bankruptcy, a decision which contributed to the systemic instability and which appeared as a political decision to add pressure to the Greek government in the context of the negotiations, in a breach of the political neutrality principle which should govern this institution;
Amendment 194 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 20 a (new)
Paragraph 20 a (new)
20a. Asks the Commission to conduct and make public an evaluation of the decision-making procedure which led the Troika, in the implementation of the last Memorandum of Understanding signed with Greece, to require savings up to 25 billion EUR for the recapitalization of Greek banks, while the SSM, which role is to assess such needs, stated on 31 October 2015, that the recapitalization needs, in a baseline scenario, were up to 4.4 billion EUR, and the most risky scenario, up to 14.4 billion EUR;
Amendment 198 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 21
Paragraph 21
21. Believes that the ECB’s supervisory strategy, while avoiding any differentiation along national lines, should reflect and safeguard pluensure decentralism ofed banking models across the EU;
Amendment 212 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 24
Paragraph 24
24. WelcomNotes the efficient and open way in which the ECB has so far fulfilled its accountability obligations towards Parliamentscope for improvement in the fulfilment of the ECB's accountability obligations towards Parliament with regard to providing more specific information on prudential supervision of banks and calls upon the ECB to continue to fully engage in this regard and to further contribute to improving Parliament’'s capacity to assess SSM policies and activities;
Amendment 222 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 25 a (new)
Paragraph 25 a (new)
25a. Considers that the ECB Annual Report on supervision should contain actual numbers on 'on-site inspections', 'internal model investigations' and a description of the subject and result of these inspections; and calls for target numbers on inspections and investigations for the coming year to be published as well;
Amendment 226 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 25 b (new)
Paragraph 25 b (new)
25b. Believes that the SSM will not be able to conduct effective banking supervision due to the EU's watered down version of Basel III which is already insufficient; calls therefore on the Commission to create more ambitious regulation within the Union, and to allow Member States to adopt more ambitious regulation should they wish to do so;
Amendment 230 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26
Paragraph 26
26. Welcomes the efficientNotes the setting up of the Single Resolution Board (SRB) and the establishment of the national resolution authorities (NRAs) in the Member States;
Amendment 231 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26 a (new)
Paragraph 26 a (new)
26a. Recalls that 4.5 trillion EUR of public money and guarantees were made available to bailed out banks; believes that all measures to avoid bail out of private banks with public money must be taken; deems that any capital injection given in the past should be turned into golden shares and the loans granted by other banks counted in the liability of the balance sheet should turn into preferred stock or shares as well. The purpose is to change the practices of the banking system, increasing the participation of a public banks network under social control, and reinforcing the capitalization rate to recover the viability and solvency of the banking system to put it in favour of social interest;
Amendment 232 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26 b (new)
Paragraph 26 b (new)
26b. Believes that in principle banks should be allowed to fail and go bankrupt. This requires a complete ban on the existence of banks that are too-big-to-fail;
Amendment 233 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26 c (new)
Paragraph 26 c (new)
26c. Regrets therefore that banking regulation at national and European level continues to allow for the existence of Systemically Important Financial Institutions (SIFI) despite their central role in causing the financial crisis and its global contagion;
Amendment 234 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26 d (new)
Paragraph 26 d (new)
26d. Believes that the existence of SIFIs not only makes it impossible to allow the banks to go bankrupt, it makes them very difficult if not impossible to resolve. Many actors are still 'too-big-to fail' and 'too- interconnected-too-fail' and 'too-complex- to-resolve'. None of these problems have been remotely addressed by the SRM;
Amendment 235 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26 e (new)
Paragraph 26 e (new)
26e. Believes that the European banking sector is as concentrated as it ever was; believes therefore that the BU has failed to break the link between banks and sovereigns;
Amendment 236 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26 f (new)
Paragraph 26 f (new)
26f. Believes it is highly necessary to separate banking activities: on one hand retail banking and on the other investment banking. Furthermore, the shadow banking system has to be duly identified and regulated preventing all the irregular banking practices (leveraged buy out, abusing of transfer prices, decapitalisation of viable companies, etc.);
Amendment 237 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26 g (new)
Paragraph 26 g (new)
26g. Believes the SRM itself encourages a greater concentration of too-big-to-fail actors in the European banking sector. The sale of business tool allows megabanks to grow even bigger by taking over ailing banks at bargain basement prices - rather than the long term value of the asset. The result of consolidation will be even more concentration and even bigger banks;
Amendment 238 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 26 h (new)
Paragraph 26 h (new)
26h. Believes that in those cases where a public intervention is the only option left to ensure macroeconomic stability, the intervention should be in a manner in which public money is not lost but is used to create a new public bank network, under a sound management but not looking for the maximum profit. The starting point should be the bailed out banks and their solvent assets with the financial support of the ECB and under social and democratic control;
Amendment 240 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 27
Paragraph 27
27. Highlights the importance of establishing efficient cooperation between the SRB and the NRAs for the smooth functioning of the SRM; considers the organisational model established by the SSM through the JSTs to be a good basis for organising cooperation within the SRM;
Amendment 254 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 33 a (new)
Paragraph 33 a (new)
33a. Calls for further regulation of banking products and their respective interest rates as well as complementing prudential regulation by asset based reserve requirements, limits to those investors being hidden as false creditor in order to avoid shareholder's risk when they behave in fact as them, and specifically the shadow banking sector in order to reduce complexity of financial markets and improve monetary transmission;
Amendment 257 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 33 b (new)
Paragraph 33 b (new)
33b. Proposes to attribute more importance to the dividend distribution limit in case of low rate of capitalisation before selling assets at whatever price. A relevant initiative would be to create a European Public Banks net. This would be based on those public contributions (for instance, from ESM) granted, deeming any of this financing, even in a retrospective way, as golden shares and the corresponding participation within the Board of directors of the banks concerned. At the same time, in equivalent cases of intervention, it would be appropriate to determine an orderly exchange process of contracted bonds, subordinated and junior debt, which are property of private banks, turning them into preferred stock or shares to improve the capitalisation rate;
Amendment 268 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 35
Paragraph 35
35. Calls on Member States to fully and swiftly implement the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive (BRRD) and the intergovernmental agreement (IGA) on transfer and mutualisation of contributions to the Single Resolution Fund; regrets the decision to set up the fund through an IGA rather than through Union law;
Amendment 287 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 36
Paragraph 36
36. Stresses the need, as a consequence of the existence of the national compartments in the SRF, to rapidly put in place an adequate bridge financing mechanism in order to provide the fund, if necessary, with sufficient resources in the period before its completion; recalls that the Eurogroup and the Ecofin ministers identified, in their statement of 18 December 2013, the possibility of having recourse to both national sources and the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), and considers the latter the most effective and credible solution, which could be implemented either through a swift revision of the ESM treaty or through appropriate implementation of the provisions of Article 13 thereof; believes however that the ESM - which has been set up with money from taxpayers - should not be used to recapitalise private banks;
Amendment 292 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 36 a (new)
Paragraph 36 a (new)
36a. Recalls that ESM funds come with harsh austerity which in the end will be passed on to citizens, contradicting any attempt to break the link between banks and sovereigns;
Amendment 295 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 37
Paragraph 37
Amendment 306 #
Motion for a resolution
Paragraph 38
Paragraph 38
38. Recalls that the credibility of the BU, and in particular of bail-in and single resolution provisions, requires a common backstop in order to be able to support the SRF, if necessary, beyond its capacity of EUR 55 billion, and considers that its setting-up should start swiftly and be based on the ESMmuch greater contributions to the SRF from the banking sector itself. Taking into account the costs of the financial crisis, the current target of EUR 55 billion is grossly insufficient. Banks should also speed up the process and make the full amount available much earlier than 2023;