It’s a pleasure to attend Euro Finance Week again this year. This is a good opportunity to reflect on the state of the banking union and the Single Supervisory Mechanism, or SSM. Four years ago, at the start of this ambitious project, scepticism was rife. Despite the general consensus that European supervision and a banking union were necessary complements to a monetary union, many questioned whether this was a realistic goal. Without wanting to sound overconfident, I believe we have largely proved the sceptics wrong. Tough and fair European supervision, backed by tougher regulation, has contributed to making our ... (full story)