European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA)

Risk monitoring | Less volatile markets earlier in 2024 and a return of search-for-yield behaviour in riskier market segments suggested a general market anticipation of a ‘soft landing’. However, markets remain very sensitive, especially to interest rate developments, deteriorating credit risk and to political and electoral news. There remains a high risk of corrections in a context of fragile market liquidity, in equity and in other markets. TRV Report → https://lnkd.in/d4RD6xKn. Main takeaways 📂 capital availability for European corporates through capital markets – stable in 2024 so far 📂 recent #ESG-related market developments sparked concerns on the ability to mobilise private capital 📂 #CryptoAssets markets continued to surge in the first half of 2024 📂 asset prices in early 2024 trended upwards with little volatility 📂 EU fund performance was positive across categories and funds exposed to fixed income instruments recorded inflows

#ICYMI 🌍 #SustainableFinanceEU weeks | ESMA published key documents which support the consistent application and supervision of sustainability reporting requirements: 📌 Guidelines on Enforcement of Sustainability Information #GLESI → https://lnkd.in/eptT9RxF 📌 Public Statement on the first application of the European Sustainability Reporting Standards → https://lnkd.in/e5VEkPq5 🎦 Video explainer → https://lnkd.in/dQeUJxXA

#ICYMI 🌍 #SustainableFinanceEU weeks | The European Supervisory Authorities called for a coherent sustainable finance framework that caters for both the green transition and enhanced consumer protection, taking into account the lessons learned from the functioning of the Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation #SFDR → https://lnkd.in/e3jT_qmm. 🌱 introduce simple and clear categories for financial products → simplifications consist of two voluntary product categories, “sustainable” and “transition” 🌱 introduce a sustainability indicator that would grade financial products → investment funds, life insurance and pension products (recommendation for the European Commission)

🚨 Call for candidates | Last chance to express your interest in joining the ESMA Consultative Working Group under the Sustainability Standing Committee → https://lnkd.in/dgnaQXTx. 📝 CWG members are selected for a renewable term of 3 years. Our goal is to ensure a balanced representation of diverse backgrounds. We are especially keen to hear from professionals from smaller EU countries and those with experience working at Issuers, Consumers or Retail Investors Associations and Investment Service Providers. 🌿 If you want to enable #SustainableFinanceEU and ensure effective integration of #ESG factors across all areas, you have until 30 August to apply.

🌍 #SustainableFinanceEU weeks, Fund management | ESMA has published the translations in all official EU languages of its Guidelines on funds’ names using ESG or sustainability-related terms → https://lnkd.in/d8rhpR3f. How will this impact the timeline? 🧭 The Guidelines will start applying on 21 November 2024.   🧭 The transitional period for funds existing before the application date will be 21 May 2025. Any new funds created on or after the application date should apply these Guidelines immediately. 🎯 The Guidelines aim to ensure that investors are protected against unsubstantiated or exaggerated sustainability claims in fund names, and to provide asset managers with clear and measurable criteria to assess their ability to use #ESG or sustainability-related terms in fund names.

#ICYMI 🌍 #SustainableFinanceEU weeks | ESMA and national competent authorities are taking steps to better monitor and detect #greenwashing. They aim to critically assess sustainability-related claims across different sectors → https://lnkd.in/eKsddUZV. 💡 What is greenwashing? The ESAs reiterated the common high-level understanding of greenwashing as a practice where sustainability-related statements, declarations, actions or communications do not clearly and fairly reflect the underlying sustainability profile of an entity, a financial product or financial services. This practice may be misleading to consumers investors, or other market participants. 🌱 ESMA indicated priority actions to enable supervisors to better mitigate greenwashing risks. What are the actions envisaged? 👇

🎦 Creating effective and attractive EU capital markets requires improving the wider market ecosystem and putting investors and companies at the heart of it. Steps are needed to ensure capital markets can play their role in supporting the financing needs of Europe. What are ESMA's recommendations? → https://lnkd.in/eXbxgpeY | Factsheet → https://lnkd.in/eP7ZWnAm. The actions proposed go beyond changes to financial regulation and are directed not only to capital market supervisors but also to EU Member States, the European Commission and EU Co-legislators as well as to the financial industry.

ESMA is proposing a methodology to categorise smart contracts, so to better understand their functionalities and features. This paper leverages natural language processing and topic modelling to cluster smart contracts into homogeneous groups - https://lnkd.in/eeebaQ3P. The methodology aims to answer regulators' calls for a closer, consistent monitoring of #DeFi and its underlying protocols.

📢 Call for candidates | Do you want to enable #SustainableFinanceEU and ensure effective integration of #ESG factors across all areas? You have until 30 August to apply for the ESMA Consultative Working Group, Sustainability Standing Committee → https://lnkd.in/dgnaQXTx.   📝 CWG members are selected for a renewable term of 3 years. We seek to ensure a balanced representation of diverse backgrounds in terms of expertise relating to one or more ESG topics.

📖 The perfect holiday reading just landed. ⛱️🌴 The ESMA Newsletter highlights the latest developments in relation to the Regulation on the Markets in Crypto-Assets #MiCA and the Digital Operational Resilience Act #DORA as well as our long-term vision on the functioning of the #SustainableFinanceEU Framework and the results of the Central Counterparties stress test → https://lnkd.in/dHQ7TXSf. Discover also: • How can you protect yourself from scams → https://lnkd.in/eehqfqd • 2023 data on cross-border investment activity of firms → https://lnkd.in/dXJNFava • 2024 Reporting Manual on the European Single Electronic Format → https://lnkd.in/d-SgnRr • CSDR consultations → https://lnkd.in/d-DkeMxs • MiFIR consultations → https://lnkd.in/dsQ-diDZ