In his speech, Benoît Cœuré, Member of the Executive Board of the European Central Bank, reflects on five years after the crisis: “Perhaps the biggest mystery facing policymakers today – and especially central bankers – is what is happening on the supply side of the economy.” Subdued price and wage pressures globally are raising questions about both the true level of supply capacity, and about how much it is being lifted by strong current demand. Given that the supply side was traditionally thought to be determined by structural factors alone – Say’s law in short – this is sparking many questions in the current public debate about the outlook for the economy, the likely path of inflation and the appropriate stance of macroeconomic policies.
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In his speech, William Coen, Secretary General of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision, will focus on the issue of market risk. First, some perspective. Ten years have passed since the start of the global financial crisis. During this period, the Basel Committee has finalised its wide-ranging and comprehensive set of post-crisis reforms. These greatly improve the quality of regulatory capital, increase capital requirements, enhance risk capture, while specifying a minimum leverage ratio requirement, adding a macroprudential overlay, and introducing international liquidity standards (BCBS (2010), (2015a), (2017)).

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The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) is urging the public to be alert to the growing threat of loan fee scams targeting borrowers. This plea comes as last year over £3.5 million was lost to loan fee fraud and reports to the FCA consumer helpline increased by 44%. Victims of loan fee fraud are often targeted while searching for loans online and are then contacted by fraudsters offering a loan. The scammer tells the victim they have to pay an upfront fee for the loan which they ultimately never receive. Once the first payment is made victims are often persuaded to make multiple payments – last year the average loss was £740.
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The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision (BCBS) issued the Fourteenth progress report on adoption of the Basel regulatory framework. The report sets out the adoption status of Basel III standards for each BCBS member jurisdiction as of end-March 2018. It includes for the first time the finalised Basel III post-crisis reforms published by the Committee in December 2017. These recent reforms will take effect from 1 January 2022.

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Complaints about payment protection insurance (PPI) drove a 13% increase in the number of complaints made to financial services firms in the second half of 2017, according to figures published by the FCA. During the second half of 2017 a total of 3.76 million complaints were received, an increase of 427,032 on the first half of the year. Complaints about PPI rose by 40% to 1.55 million, the highest level of complaints about PPI for more than four years.
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The Financial Stability Board (FSB) published Strengthening Governance Frameworks to Mitigate Misconduct Risk, which provides a toolkit that firms and supervisors can use to tackle the causes and consequences of misconduct.

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The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) publishes its 2017 annual report on the enforcement and regulatory activities of accounting enforcers within the European Union (EU). In 2017 ESMA and European Enforcers continued to engage in regular supervisory convergence activities on IFRS. Moreover, considering the new standards IFRS 9 Financial Instruments and IFRS 15 Revenue from Contracts with Customers, in October 2017 ESMA published the results of a separate fact-finding exercise on the transitional disclosures regarding these standards. In addition, ESMA conducted a Peer Review on the application of its Guidelines of Enforcement of Financial Information by the National Competent Authorities (NCAs).

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The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has published the latest step in its response to the concerns identified through its asset management market study. This is part of a package of remedies to ensure fund managers compete on the value they deliver, and act in the interests of the millions who entrust them with their savings. It includes: Final rules following a previous consultation, focused on the duties of fund managers as the agents of investors in their funds and a consultation on proposed rules and guidance, focused on improving the information that investors get about funds.

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In his speech of Andreas Dombret, Member of the Executive Board of the Deutsche Bundesbank, will focus on regulatory topics in Europe that are of special interest to Brazil as well, namely the finalisation of global post-crisis regulation and the regulatory challenges to be met in a digital financial world.

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Members of the WP29 have issued guidance on how individuals may exercise their rights as data subjects and make use of the controls currently provided by social media platforms. The Working Party 29 (WP29), the group uniting European data protection authorities, announces its full support for the ongoing investigations by national privacy authorities into the collection and use of personal data by and through social media. In addition, the WP 29 will create a Social Media Working Group to develop a long-term strategy on the issue.

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