At the same time, the principle of cooperation between the responsible authorities is forcefully stated in the EU Single Market legislation, and several Directives establish a number of common regulations, in order to avoid the drawbacks of a fully decentralised approach vis-à-vis an increasingly integrated market. Hence, we could say that cooperation is already a “second pillar” of the supervisory framework, alongside national competence.
Bilateral cooperation has been established through a nexus of memoranda of understanding. In addition, supervisory forums for multilateral cooperation have been set up. The Banking Supervision Committee of the European System of Central Banks is the key present forum for this form of cooperation.