financial lobby

All eyes may be on the 'Brexit' process, but far more attention needs to be given to the way in which post-Brexit EU-UK trade negotiations are being conducted. While corporate interests seek to shape the future trade deal in their own interests, the public remains in the dark.

The EU is about to adopt new rules that will help trade in securitised loans, the very financial instruments that helped cause the 2008 financial crisis. Despite warning signs of a new 'subprime bubble' in car loans coming from the US, carmakers and financiers have lobbied the EU to make it easier to speculate on such loans.

ECB advisory groups are used as lobby platforms by the financial industry, our new report shows. 'Open door for forces of finance at the ECB' reveals that the advisory groups counselling the European Central Bank are dominated by representatives of some of the most influential global financial corporations.

The investment bank Goldman Sachs has revised its registration in the EU's lobby transparency register and has substantially increased its declared lobby spend from the 2013 figure of less than €50,000 to €700,000-€799,999 for 2014. This compounds Corporate Europe Observatory's view that Goldman Sachs' original registration was not a full reflection of its EU lobbying activity. Yet despite this under-reporting, for five months the register secretariat took little action and Goldman Sachs was able to secure at least four meetings with top Commission officials.

Newly-released documents show that as far as financial regulation is concerned, lobbyists are besieging the Commission – which has an open door policy towards them. Can the new Commission fare better? And why is its prospective commissioner responsible for this area, Jonathan Hill, a former financial lobbyist?

The announcement today that Jean-Claude Juncker, president-elect of the European commission, will hand responsibility for financial services to Jonathan Hill compounds CEO's view that British PM David Cameron should withdraw his nomination of Hill.

Despite a manifest presence of “the financial lobby” in the EU decision-making, until now there has been no comprehensive survey of its size and power in the EU. A new report by CEO, ÖGB Europabüro and AK EUROPA is intended to fill that void. The findings are stunning. In total the financial industry spends more than €120 million per year on lobbying in Brussels and employs more than 1700 lobbyists.

5 years after the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers, and the beginning of the worst economic crisis in decades, the EU has not delivered on promises of strong regulation of the financial sector. A swift overhaul is needed.

To the Executive Board of the European Central Bank Concerning the President’s membership of the Group of Thirty. This letter is to complain about the about the European Central Bank’s response to my letter (on behalf of Corporate Europe Observatory) about ECB President Draghi’s membership of the Group of Thirty which failed to adequately address the concerns I raised.