“The European financial passport loophole has become a real system” | EUROtoday

Qfourteen years spent on the entrance line of economic disputes watching falsely spectacular financial savings merchandise, contracts with intentionally incomprehensible clauses, and infrequently the naivety of small savers too keen to achieve… At 78, Marielle Cohen-Branche left, at 1^er December 2025, her place as mediator of the Financial Markets Authority (AMF), after having been appointed there for the primary time in 2011.

His work served as the primary line of protection to guard retail traders. This is an easy mediation, based mostly by definition on an amicable settlement between the 2 events. But, total, it really works: in 95% of circumstances – out of a complete of round 3,000 information acquired in 2024 – the choice rendered by the mediator was accepted. The profit is apparent: small savers and monetary establishments thus keep away from going to court docket and velocity up the decision of a dispute.

With this distinctive perspective on monetary cheats massive and small, M^me Cohen-Branche was on the forefront of seeing the principle developments of latest years: the rising significance of social networks, the explosion of cryptoassets, the rejuvenation of savers for the reason that Covid-19 disaster… She additionally notes a significant gap within the racket, which has recurrently hampered her in her work: the European monetary passport, which permits a agency established wherever within the European Union to promote its merchandise in the remainder of the only market.

Remediable difficulties

“On paper, it is a very good idea, but it is based on the erroneous premise that all regulators have the same means, or even the same will. » Clearly, a financial company registered in Cyprus or Malta – to take two jurisdictions not at all by chance – is supervised in a much lighter manner than in France, although it can sell its products there. The flaw has become a real system. “Professionals approved in Cyprus too often have very few Cypriot clients”notes M^me Cohen-Branch.

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