What changed

AMENDMENTS

8.6.2023

The Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs calls on the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy, as the committee responsible, to take the following into account:

Mr Cristian Bușoi

Amendment 1

Chair

Proposal for a regulation

Committee on Industry, Research and Energy

Recital 2

BRUSSELS

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Subject: Opinion on the Commission proposal on amending Regulations (EU) No 1227/2011 and (EU) 2019/942 to improve the Union’s protection against market manipulation in the wholesale energy market (2023/0076 (COD)) and amending Regulations (EU) 2019/943 and (EU) 2019/942 as well as Directives (EU) 2018/2001 and (EU) 2019/944 to improve the Union’s electricity market design (2023/0077(COD))

Amendment 2

Dear Mr Chair,

Proposal for a regulation

Under the procedure referred to above, the Committee on Budgets’ Coordinators decided at their meeting of 31 January 2023 to adopt an opinion under the Rule 56plus in the form of a letter covering both legislative files.

Recital 3

The committee adopted the opinion at its meeting on 08/06/2023 and mandated me to convey the position set out below.

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Background to the proposal related to the budgetary impact on the European Union Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators (ACER) and ITER

Amendment 3

On 14 March 2023, the Commission proposed to reform the EU's electricity market design to accelerate a surge in renewables and the phase-out of gas, make consumer bills less dependent on volatile fossil fuel prices, better protect consumers from future price spikes and potential market manipulation, and make the EU's industry clean and more competitive.

Proposal for a regulation

This translated into two proposal amending several existing pieces of legislation:

Recital 6 a (new)

1. Amendment of the REMIT (Union's protection of against market manipulation in the wholesale energy market) and the corresponding amendment of the ACER Regulation.

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2. Amendments of the EMD (Electricity market design) Regulation and Directive, the Renewable Energy Directive and the corresponding amendment of the ACER Regulation.

Amendment 4

The first batch will entrust ACER with new tasks, essentially authorisation and supervisory powers on electricity data platforms, a role of centralisation of suspicious transactions on the electricity market and investigation and extended enforcement powers of the REMIT Regulation. According to the Commission assessment, ACER would need 25 additional full time equivalent (FTE) and EUR 4.2 million operational expenditure over 2025-2027. 2/3 of the staff as well as the operational expenditure will be financed from extended fee. This leaves EUR 2.9 million to be financed from the EU budget over 2025-2027.

Proposal for a regulation

The second batch will also entrust ACER with new tasks, essentially ex-ante approval of hubs for the trading of forward electricity contracts and of the methodology underpinning the reporting by MS on the need for flexibility in the electricity market. According to the Commission assessment, ACER would need 4 additional FTE for an amount of EUR 2.8 million over 2024-2027.

Recital 8

In total, the impact of the increase for ACER on the EU budget would be EUR 5.7 million over 2024-2027. The Legislative financial statement indicates that the amount will be redeployed from the ITER budget line.

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Position of the Committee on Budgets

Amendment 5

Overall, the budgetary impact of the proposal is not substantial and the ACER Regulation is only modified to extend the scope of the fee-financed activities and add the tasks related to the amendment of the EMD. The Commission informs that the offsetting planned redeployment from ITER to ACER is not negatively impacting ITER to deliver upon its objectives under the MFF and reminds that the total amount of this planned offsetting of EUR 5.7 million accounts for 0.1% of the entire ITER budget over the MFF.

Proposal for a regulation

Still, the Committee on Budgets observes, that since the beginning of this MFF, several legislative proposals were presented by the Commission entrusting ACER with new, additional tasks which require additional financial means.

Recital 10

These combined new tasks for ACER add up to an increase in staff (from the MFF baseline situation of 77 permanent, 36 contract agents, 4 Seconded national experts to 142 permanent, 47 contract agents, 10 Seconded national experts) and in projected budgetary needs (budget is projected to increase up to 22,4 Million Euro in 2027 instead of 16,3 Million Euro).

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The need to resort to redeployments in order to ensure the necessary additional operational and administrative resources constitutes a significant impact on the EU budget for the remainder of the financial programming period and beyond.

Amendment 6

The European Parliament, in numerous reports and resolutions, has reiterated its general position that new tasks should be covered by fresh resources and that the practice of ‘compensation’ of reinforcements through back loading or reductions in programme envelopes should be prevented. Nevertheless, given the accumulation of new initiatives, additional needs and unexpected developments, it must be soberly stated that the default sources for such fresh appropriations in the EU budget - unallocated margins under the MFF ceilings and non-thematic special instruments are like to be virtually or even entirely depleted as of B2024.

Proposal for a regulation

The Committee on Budgets stands ready to follow the proposal closely during the next procedural steps in particular on discussions on the human and financial resources of ACER and any potential budgetary consequences.

Recital 11

Yours sincerely,

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Johan Van Overtveldt

Amendment 7

Proposal for a regulation

Recital 13

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Justification

While data collection is imperative, we also need to facilitate reporting standards horizontally in EU legislation to avoid duplicative reporting from market participants

Amendment 8

Proposal for a regulation

Recital 14

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Amendment 9

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 1 – point a

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 1 – Paragraph 2

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Justification

Adding reference to the Market Abuse Regulation

Amendment 10

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 1 – point b

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 1 – Paragraph 3 – Subparagraph 2

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Justification

Information sharing between ACER, NRAs, ESMA and NCAs is essential. Rather than prescriptively setting a timeframe, this should be done on a regular or continuous basis in order to spot at an early point any potential breaches of the Market Abuse Regulation and to take appropriate action to mitigate the effects of such breaches. Therefore the authorities should be free to share information as frequently as possible.

Amendment 11

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 2 – point g

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 7

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Justification

This is to clarify the definition of market participant and make it clearer that it is any of the mentioned operators entering into transactions, and that PPATs are not included if they do not enter into transactions. This is also important to ensure that liquidity remains in the market through conflating PPATs with actual market participants

Amendment 12

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 2 – point h

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 8a

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Justification

For consistency with the definition of market participants and to avoid double reporting

Amendment 13

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 2 – point j

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 18

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Amendment 14

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 2 – point j

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 2 – paragraph 1 – point 19

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Justification

This is necessary to avoid duplication of reporting and regulatory complexity between REMIT and MiFID.

Amendment 15

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 6

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 5a – paragraph 1

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Justification

It's important that algorithmic trading has enough safeguards, in the form of persons monitoring the sending of data, to ensure that it does not contribute to market volatility, as was seen during the 2022 period.

Amendment 16

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 6

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 5a – paragraph 2 – subparagraph 3

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Amendment 17

Proposal for a regulation

Article 1 – paragraph 1 – point 6

Regulation (EU) No 1227/2011

Article 5a – paragraph 3 – subparagraph 3

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