ESBG encourages EU regulators to prioritise the following action points:

• Support for codes of conduct for all market participants on applications of new technologies in the financial sector
• Enhancing legal clarity through guidance at EU level for technologies and/or use cases
• Strengthening of existing European standardisation and specifications initiatives (e.g. in payments or in API developments)
• Supporting further initiatives like the European Institute of Innovation and Technology partner network that helps business and entrepreneurs be at the frontier of digital innovation by providing them with technology, talent and growth support
• Setting up and funding expert groups to define and implement nascent technology pilots.
• Funding experimentation on certain applications of new technologies in finance at European level to encourage the emergence of EU-wide businesses that would be able to compete with comparably sized peers from other jurisdictions.
• Cross-border coordination within the EU is fundamental to promote the scale-up of technological innovation and to prevent an unlevel playing field and regulatory arbitrage. Fragmentation (e.g. differences in regulatory requirement) is already limiting the potential of technological developments, which also affects the overall competitiveness of the EU.
• Establishing a framework for consent management to ensure that consumers have the correct tools to share and control their personal data.

The EU lags behind other jurisdictions in terms of capacity and competitiveness to innovate, scale-up and compete with non-European players. European banks oftentimes face difficulties in accessing platforms and technical interfaces of BigTech companies, which are increasingly entering the financial sector. ​​​

​The financial sector has historically been subject to high regulatory and supervisory requirements. Such requirements have had an overall positive impact on society and have helped the financial sector show resilience in response to the recent COVID-19 crisis. The pandemic crisis has also triggered an increase in customer demand for digital financial services, making regulatory frameworks for digitalisation even more important.