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Ursula von der Leyen, now in her second term as European Commission president, has set out her plans for the new college, with her priorities including topics such as payments, data and AI.
Payments look set to be a focal point for the incoming commissioner for financial services, once they are confirmed.
Mairead McGuinness, who became popular with the payments market during her tenure, is out, with Maria Luís Albuquerque set to take her place, pending the approval of the European Parliament.
Albuquerque has experience in the industry: a member of Portugal’s centre-left Social Democratic Party, she served as the country’s finance minister between 2013 and 2015.
Payments and open finance
In her mission letter to the candidate commissioner, von der Leyen has said that she “should continue work on improving digital finance and payments to support new technologies in our financial system, implement an open access framework to financial data for companies and continue monitoring new opportunities and risks arising from digital technologies”.
This work will largely include getting key pieces of legislation across the finishing line.
These include the Payment Services Regulation (PSR) and the third iteration of the Payment Services Directive (PSD3), as well as the Financial Data Access (FiDA) regulation, which should make way for regulated open finance in the trading bloc.
In the letter, von der Leyen told Albuquerque that “I want you to assess artificial intelligence [AI] deployment in the financial sector”.
Although the EU’s financial sector is unlikely to be subject to any AI-specific regulation in the near term, a consultation on AI use in the sector was published over the summer and closed on September 13, and the outcomes from this process will likely feed into whatever the commission chooses to do next.
The wider role
More broadly, von der Leyen said that the new commissioner “should ensure a robust retail payments infrastructure”.
This could include overseeing the development of a digital euro from the commission’s side.
Although the digital euro is the project of the European Central Bank (ECB), the commission has led on the regulatory response, issuing a legal framework for the digital euro alongside other payments regulation in June 2023.
In addition, Albuquerque and her department are likely to be keeping a close eye on the passage of the Instant Payments Regulation (IPR).
This includes the changes it will bring to settlement finality, which will give payments and e-money institutions direct access to countries’ payment systems for the first time in the EU.
These changes will no doubt have an impact on retail payment infrastructure — if the EU is to have a “robust” infrastructure for retail payments, the focus on sovereignty will likely continue.
Albuquerque and her staff will doubtless be keeping a close eye on the trajectory of the European Payments Initiative and market-led projects such as the SEPA Payment Account Access (SPAA) scheme.
Financial crime and sanctions
In her letter, von der Leyen also touched on issues regarding financial crime.
In the last commission, Malta went onto the Financial Action Task Force's (FATF) greylist, and although it came off relatively quickly, Bulgaria and Croatia also found themselves under increased scrutiny not long after.
If the EU is to influence global standards on regulation, it needs to ensure it is a leader in areas such as tackling money laundering, so this will also be a priority for the new commissioner.
“You will ensure the implementation and enforcement of the anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism package and to continue to strengthen the international role of the Union in the fight against financial crime,” von der Leyen wrote.
“You will prepare the launch of AMLA, the Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism Authority.”
Further, von der Leyen said that the commissioner “will work closely with the High Representative/Vice-President to strengthen our strategic approach to sanctions, notably to ensure that we can react flexibly to new threats including cyber and hybrid attacks”.
“You will also ensure that EU sanctions are properly enforced, identifying and closing any loopholes in implementation.”
This shows that Russia’s ongoing aggression against Ukraine remains a pressing issue for the EU, with von der Leyen keen to keep up the pressure on regulators and business on ensuring sanctions work effectively.
“Given the scale of the challenges and the many issues in our in-tray, we must hit the ground running on day one,” von der Leyen concluded in the letter. “I invite you to take contact with your future services to prepare your hearing and the work ahead.”
