In December 2020, the Federal Cabinet adopted the draft of the new Securities Institutions Act, as the Act on the Supervision of Securities Institutions. With this law, financial stability is to be strengthened and financial market supervision is to be set up according to the challenges of the 21st century. The risk susceptibility of individual business models and the size of the respective securities institutions are also to be taken into account.

The Securities Institutions Act essentially contains:

• Requirements for initial capital
• Requirements for business organisation and certain notification obligations
• Supervisory powers of the competent supervisory authorities, in particular with regard to the solvency of securities institutions and capital and liquidity requirements
• Benchmarks for assessing the adequacy of internal capital requirements
• Requirements for the management board and supervisory bodies of investment institutions with regard to internal corporate governance
• Rules on the remuneration policy towards certain categories of employees of the securities institutions.

Marcus Columbu and Swantje Teller will subject the Securities Institutions Act to a critical appraisal and shed light on what is in store for financial market actors and what, in particular, needs to be paid attention to.