The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), the EU’s financial markets regulator and supervisor, has today published its first consolidated report on sanctions and measures imposed by the National Competent Authorities (NCAs) in Member States in 2023.
In 2023, more than 970 administrative sanctions and measures were imposed across EU Member States in financial sectors under ESMA’s remit. The aggregated value of administrative fines amounted to more than 71 million EUR. The highest amounts of administrative fines were imposed under the Market Abuse Regulation (MAR) and the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive II (MiFID II). Overall, the report highlights that there is still room for more convergence between NCAs in the exercise of their sanctioning powers.
The use of sanctions is only one of multiple tools in the NCA’s supervisory toolkit, and supervisory effectiveness cannot be measured solely based on the number or value of the sanctions imposed in a Member State. The consolidated report does not provide a full picture of national enforcement activities; for example, these may also include more informal actions, and not all criminal sanctions are included in the scope of the report.
The data on the use of sanctions included in this report was reported to ESMA by the NCAs. In line with the ESMA Strategy 2023-2028, the consolidated report contributes to supervisory and enforcement convergence and facilitates greater transparency on sanctions.
Next steps
Building on this report, ESMA will further foster the effective and consistent implementation of capital markets rules and ensure similar breaches lead to similar enforcement outcomes across the EU.
The underlying data is available in excel format and can be downloaded here. In addition, a snapshot of the report’s key findings is published here.
