European Union antitrust regulators will soon present guidelines to help banks that are recipients of state aid return to viability, EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said on Tuesday. She also said the European Commission would release its final report on competition in the pharmaceutical sector before the end of the summer break but she declined to name a date.
A source familiar with the matter said last month the bank restructuring guidelines would be presented in June. Asked about the timing on the sidelines of a forum hosted by the Paris-based Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Kroes told reporters the guidelines would be published "not long from now". She declined to be more specific.
"We are still not at the end," she said when asked if she expected more bank restructurings in the coming months. "We have to restructure the financial world, there should be new business models and it shouldn't be as it was, it should take into account the lessons that we have to learn," she told reporters. "Because if the financial sector is not recovering, we can't expect the economy to be in good shape again," she said. The European Commission is tasked with ensuring state aid does not distort competition in the 27-country European Union.
As the financial crisis deepened last September, the EU executive issued guidelines on how European countries could recapitalise stricken lenders, provide state guarantees and deal with impaired assets on banks' balance sheets. It has approved some 70 cases of bank rescue plans across Europe, Kroes said.