Structural Changes in the EU Banking Sector

The European Central Bank (ECB) is today releasing a report on structural developments in the EU banking sector. The report has been prepared by the Banking Supervision Committee (BSC) of the European System of Central Banks in the context of its activity of monitoring the stability of the EU banking sector, and as such complements the BSC's semi-annual macro-prudential analysis. The aim of the report is to provide an overview of the most relevant structural developments in the EU banking sector in 2001 and, to a certain extent, in the first half of 2002. The ECB intends to publish further such reports on a regular basis. The analysis is based on qualitative assessments by central banks and banking supervisory authorities and quantitative information stemming from several sources.…