A few days ago, on 7 February, we celebrated the thirtieth birthday of the European Union and of the Maastricht Treaty. I was personally present during the signature of this Treaty, which promoted “the strengthening of economic and monetary union, ultimately including a single currency”. We have successfully established a monetary Eurosystem, however a real financial Eurosystem must now develop. Let me therefore share some proposals on the Banking Union and the Capital Markets Union (CMU), which are the two cornerstones for such a financial Eurosystem. We are all aware the Banking Union is for 19 countries, and tomorrow 21, while the CMU is for 27. But allow me to mix them today with a common core – the euro area – and a common purpose – the right funding of our economies. I will quote two thriller books today. You may rightly think of The postman always rings twice: Andrea Enria and myself already conveyed this message quite plainly regarding the Banking Union during the last Eurofi session in September. You may also think that these projects are more or less stuck. It is true that there has been deadlock and I will list the bad reasons for this. But there are also good reasons why we can break this deadlock now and give the projects of Banking Union and CMU new momentum (I). I will then describe the new possible steps for the Banking Union (II) and the CMU (III). I.
However, today marks not an end, but a beginning. In just over a week the Single Supervisory Mechanism will become fully operational, and the immediate future poses challenges of the first order both for supervisors, involving the adaptation of our structures and functioning to the needs of the new European mechanism, and for banks. I would not like to conclude without thanking the whole team at the Banco de España, which has been working for months in collaboration with the European Central Bank, the banks and the audit firms to successfully see through this complex exercise. And, naturally, I would also like to extend my thanks to the teams at all of the banks which, for months, have devoted their best technical capabilities to this end. Thank you very much for your interest and for being here today. 4  BIS central bankers’ speeches