McCreevy Visits China And Japan To Discuss Financial Services, IP

by Mary Swire, for LawAndTax-News.com, Hong Kong

12 June 2007

European Internal Market and Services Commissioner, Charlie McCreevy is this week visiting China and Japan.

During his visit to China, which began on Sunday and ends today, Commissioner McCreevy has discussed the deepening of the EU's economic relations with China, and the strengthening of regulatory cooperation in a number of key policy areas including financial services, accounting and auditing, securities and asset management, public procurement and intellectual property rights.

In the area of financial services, particular emphasis has been placed in his meetings with Chinese officials on boosting enhanced cooperation through dialogue among regulators in order to promote convergence and market access in financial sectors.

In the area of accounting and auditing, he is encouraging EU-China cooperation in order to ensure the coherent interpretation and application of International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS), as by 2009 the EU is to assess whether Chinese accounting rules are equivalent to IFRS. Securities and asset management was also be high on the agenda.

Commissioner McCreevy has further stated that he intends to use his first visit to Japan (which begins today and concludes on Friday) to give political impetus to numerous issues that are on the agenda of the biannual EU-Japan Regulatory Reform Dialogue. He will hold a wide range of meetings with government ministers and industry officials to discuss the latest developments on such issues as financial services, public procurement, intellectual property rights, postal privatisation and overall progress in regulatory reform.

In the area of financial services, he is reported to be particularly keen to look at the business environment under the new Financial Instruments and Exchange Law (FIEL), and to sound out the prospects for European financial institutions to provide fully-fledged, integrated financial services to their customers in Japan. Hedge funds, accounting standards convergence and the respective audit oversight systems will also be on the agenda.

Given the upcoming privatisation of Japan Post, Commissioner McCreevy will underline the importance of creating a level playing field between the postal entities and private sector competitors and to ensure that postal insurance, postal savings and postal delivery are obliged to meet the same requirements as their private sector competitors.

He will also visit the Tokyo Stock Exchange and give a keynote speech at a symposium on financial services which is open to the media.

Recommended