Dl Jb 2006 En.Pdf
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President’s Statement Last year was marred by a serious case of in-house corruption which shook BaFin and affected me personally. The matter tarnished our reputation and overshadowed the excellent performance of BaFin’s employees in the public’s eyes. The situation is extremely regrettable, since last year we further enhanced the quality of our supervisory services. During 2006, we enthusiastically focused our efforts on modernising our services. The report at hand details the progress we made last year. Our aim is to provide principle-based, risk-oriented and high-quality supervisory services. We are already well on the way to achieving our aim – a view which those involved also appear to share: around 40 per cent of the banks the German Institute for Economic Research questioned anonymously in 2006 thought that German supervisory services had improved since the foundation of BaFin. Moreover, three-quarters of those questioned regard our services as an “opportunity to structure their business procedures in line with the market”. We are, of course, delighted about the positive response. However, this is no reason for us to relax our efforts. Everyone wants to improve. At a time when ongoing changes in the financial markets seem the only constant, we must continue to develop in order to meet new multifaceted requirements. A large number of them originate from Brussels, where most financial market regulations are devised. For the European financial sector, the regulations must be implemented uniformly and applied consistently in order to fulfil the objectives of the single European market, also with regard to supervisory services. The target can be reached only if national controllers develop a pan-European supervisory culture. This year, all the EU committees and bodies concerned will be focusing on this task. BaFin, too, will remain committed to helping achieve this aim as quickly as possible. Jochen Sanio President Contents I Highlights 9 II Economic environment 13 1 Financial markets ...................................................... 13 2 Banks ...................................................................... 18 3 Insurers .................................................................. 23 4 Retail market developments ........................................ 27 III International 31 1 International harmonisation ........................................ 31 1.1 Market transparency and integrity.......................... 33 1.2 Organisational requirements and rules of conduct .... 41 1.3 Risk management and capital................................ 42 2 Basel II .................................................................... 46 3 Solvency II .............................................................. 49 4 Accounting and enforcement........................................ 56 5 International cooperation ............................................ 59 5.1 Groups operating on a cross-border basis .............. 59 5.2 Memoranda of Understanding and technical cooperation ........................................................ 62 IV Risk-oriented supervision 67 1 Risk-oriented approach to supervision .......................... 67 1.1 Risk identification and classification........................ 67 1.2 Audit planning .................................................... 68 2 Banks ...................................................................... 69 2.1 Risk classification ................................................ 69 2.2 Special audits...................................................... 70 3 Insurers .................................................................... 75 3.1 Risk classification ................................................ 75 3.2 On-site inspections .............................................. 76 4 Investment companies ................................................ 77 5 Financial services institutions ...................................... 78 Contents V Supervision of insurance undertakings and pension funds 81 1 Basis for supervision .................................................. 81 1.1 Amendment of the Insurance Supervision Act.......... 81 1.2 The new system for supervising insurance intermediaries .................................................... 83 1.3 Healthcare reform ................................................ 84 1.4 Reform of VVG .................................................... 85 1.5 Ordinances ........................................................ 88 1.6 Supervisory practice ............................................ 89 2 Ongoing supervision .................................................. 89 2.1 Authorised insurance undertakings and pension funds................................................ 89 2.2 Interim reporting ................................................ 91 2.2.1 Business development ................................ 91 2.2.2 Investments .............................................. 93 2.3 Solvency ............................................................ 94 2.4 Stress testing ...................................................... 96 2.5 Composition of the risk asset ratio ........................ 98 2.6 Trust activity and internal company guidelines for investment .................................................. 101 2.7 Life insurance .................................................... 101 2.8 Private health insurance...................................... 105 2.9 Property/casualty insurance and reinsurance ........ 107 2.10Pensionskassen and pension funds ...................... 109 VI Supervision of banks and financial services institutions 111 1 Basis for supervision ................................................ 111 1.1 Amendment of the Banking Act............................ 111 1.2 Solvency Ordinance ............................................ 114 1.3 Ordinance governing large exposures and loans .... 116 1.4 Liquidity Ordinance ............................................ 118 1.5 Reports Ordinance.............................................. 118 1.6 Further changes to supervisory law ...................... 119 1.7 Stress testing .................................................... 121 2 Ongoing solvency supervision .................................. 122 2.1 Authorised banks .............................................. 122 2.2 Solvency .......................................................... 125 2.3 Supervisory actions ............................................ 126 2.4 IRBA and AMA application procedures .................. 130 2.5 Non-performing loans ........................................ 131 2.6 Financial services institutions .............................. 133 3 Ongoing market supervision ...................................... 136 3.1 Credit institutions and financial services institutions .. 136 3.2 Rules of conduct with regard to financial analysis .. 138 Contents VII Supervision of securities trading and investment business 143 1 Basis for supervision ................................................ 143 1.1 Act implementing the MiFID ................................ 143 1.2 Act implementing the Transparency Directive ........ 145 1.3 REITs................................................................ 146 1.4 Act implementing the Takeover Directive .............. 147 1.5 New investment regulations ................................ 147 2 Prospectuses............................................................ 148 2.1 Securities prospectuses ...................................... 148 2.1.1 Prospectus examination ............................ 148 2.1.2 Financial information in securities prospectuses .......................................... 150 2.2 Non-securities investment prospectuses .............. 151 3 Supervision of investment business ............................ 153 3.1 Investment companies........................................ 153 3.2 Real estate funds .............................................. 155 3.3 Market supervision ............................................ 157 3.4 Hedge funds ...................................................... 158 3.5 Foreign investment funds .................................... 160 4 Monitoring of market transparency and integrity .......... 163 4.1 Market analysis ................................................ 163 4.2 Insider trading .................................................. 166 4.3 Market manipulation .......................................... 170 4.4 Ad hoc disclosure and directors’ dealings .............. 175 4.5 Voting rights...................................................... 178 5 Corporate takeovers.................................................. 181 5.1 Offer procedures ................................................ 181 5.2 Exemption procedures ........................................ 185 5.3 Legal decisions on acting in concert...................... 186 5.4 Fine procedures ................................................ 187 6 Balance sheet control/enforcement ............................ 188 VIII Cross-sectoral responsibilities 193 1 Combating money laundering .................................... 193 1.1 International anti-money laundering measures ...... 193 1.2 Anti-money laundering measures at banks, insurance companies and financial services institutions ............................................ 194 2 Account access procedure.......................................... 196 3 Licensing requirements and prosecution of unauthorised transactions.......................................... 197 3.1 Assessment of licensing/authorisation