The European Commission today adopted a comprehensive set of measures to remove barriers and unlock the full potential of the EU's single market for financial services. This package is a central part of the strategy to the union of savings and investment (UEI), which aims to create a more integrated, efficient and competitive financial system, offering EU citizens better options for increasing their wealth and helping businesses access finance.
More integrated capital markets are essential to strengthen the EU's economic power and achieve strategic priorities such as competitiveness, digital and green transitions, defence and security. Further integration of financial markets is not an end in itself, but a means to create a single market for financial services that is greater than the sum of its national parts. Simplified access to capital markets reduces costs and makes markets more attractive to investors and businesses in all Member States, regardless of their size.
Despite recent progress, EU financial markets remain considerably fragmented, small and uncompetitive, preventing potential economies of scale and efficiency gains. In 2024, market capitalisation represented 73 % of EU GDP, compared to 270 % in the United States. Financial institutions still face different requirements and practices across Member States, which hinders cross-border operations and restricts opportunities for both citizens and businesses, negatively impacting the EU's economy and competitiveness.
The package of measures presented today significantly simplifies the EU regulatory and supervisory framework and comes just nine months after its announcement in the SSM strategy, underlining the political importance and urgency of this issue.
Proposed measures
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measures aimed at removing barriers to integrationin trading, post-trading and asset management activities. It aims to enable market participants to operate more smoothly across Member States, thereby reducing cost differences between domestic and cross-border transactions. Proposed measures include improving passporting opportunities for regulated markets (RMs) and central securities depositories (CSDs), introducing a 'pan-European market operator« (PEMO) status for trading venue operators to streamline corporate structures and licences into a single entity or single licence format, and the streamlining of cross-border distribution of investment funds (UCITS and AIFs) in the Union.
Facilitating innovation
The package focuses on removing regulatory barriers to innovation related to distributed ledger technology (DLT). It adapts the regulatory framework to support these technologies and amends the DLT Pilot Regulation (DLTPR) to relax limits, increase proportionality and flexibility, and ensure legal certainty, thereby encouraging the adoption of new technologies in the financial sector.
Streamlining and strengthening supervision
The improvements to the supervisory framework are closely linked to the removal of regulatory barriers. The package aims to address the inconsistencies and complexities of fragmented national supervisory approaches, making supervision more effective and conducive to cross-border activities, while remaining responsive to emerging risks. This includes transferring direct supervisory powers over significant market infrastructures, such as certain trading venues, central counterparties (CCPs), CSDs and all crypto-asset service providers (CASP), to the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), and strengthening ESMA's coordination role for the asset management sector.
Simplification and reduction of the burden
As seen in previous UES measures, the package will further simplify the capital markets framework by converting directives into regulations, streamlining Level 2 delegations and reducing national options and discretionary powers to prevent overregulation.
Background
Strengthening the EU economy and its international position is at the heart of the European Commission's mandate. The Compass for Competitiveness outlines how these objectives can be achieved, with the Savings and Investment Union (SIU) strategy playing a key role in implementing this plan. In order to improve the EU's competitiveness, the European Council stresses the importance of creating unified and robust European capital markets that are accessible to everyone in the EU. In March 2025, the Council asked the Commission to work on capital market surveillance and reducing fragmentation. In September 2025, Parliament backed the Commission's plan for new legislation to improve trading and post-trading systems, remove cross-border barriers and update the framework for new technologies.
Next steps
The proposals must now be negotiated and approved by the European Parliament and the Council. These components are interconnected and together form a coherent set of reforms that are essential for the establishment of a genuine single market throughout the investment chain. Maintaining the unity of the package is crucial. The Commission is committed to working closely with the European Parliament, Member States and other stakeholders to ensure the swift and effective implementation of these measures.
For further information
Measures adopted concerning the «market integration» package»
Quote(s)
For too long, Europe has tolerated a level of fragmentation that holds back our economy. Today, we are making a deliberate choice to change course. By building a truly single financial market, we will offer citizens better opportunities to increase their wealth and unlock more funding for Europe's priorities. Market integration is not a technical exercise, it is a political imperative for Europe's prosperity and global relevance.