On 18 October 2019, the Council of the EU (Council) published two notes from the General Secretariat of the Council to the Permanent Representatives Committee (COREPER):
- an information note on the proposed Regulation on the prudential requirements of investment firms and amending the Capital Requirements Regulation, the Markets in Financial Instruments Regulation and the European Banking Authority Regulation (altogether, the Investment Firms Regulation); and
- an information note on the proposed Directive on the prudential supervision of investment firms and amending the Capital Requirements Directive and revised Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (altogether, the Investment Firms Directive).
Both information notes provide an explanation of the outcomes of the European Parliament’s (EP) first reading and corrigendum procedure. The General Secretariat notes that a number of informal contacts have taken place between the Council, EP and the European Commission (Commission) with a view to reaching an agreement on these legislative files at first reading. The files were expected to undergo the corrigendum procedure in the new EP after adoption by the previous EP of its position at first reading.
The General Secretariat also provides an overview of the voting procedure of these files. At its sitting on 16 April 2019, and following informal interinstitutional negotiations, the EP adopted an amendment (without legal linguistic revision) to the Commission proposal and a legislative resolution with a view to the adoption of the proposals, constituting the EP’s position at first reading. This reflects what had been provisionally agreed between the institutions.
Upon finalisation of the adopted text by the legal linguists on 10 October 2019, the EP approved a corrigendum to the position adopted at first reading for each file. With the corrigenda, the Council is now able to approve the position of the EP as set out in the Annex to the information notes, resulting in the end of the first reading for both institutions.
The files would then be adopted in the wording which corresponds to the EP’s position.