Press release (includes charts and graphs): “Since the crisis started in 2008, the European Commission has worked hard to learn all the lessons from the crisis and create a safer and sounder financial sector. The Commission has proposed 28 new rules to better regulate, supervise, and govern the financial sector so that in future taxpayers will not foot the bill when banks make mistakes. Most of these rules are now in force or being finalised.  As the financial crisis evolved and turned into the Eurozone debt crisis in 2010/11, it became clear that, for those countries which shared a currency and were even more interdependent, more had to be done, in particular to break the vicious circle between banks and national finances. (See box 1) That is why, in June 2012, Heads of State and Government agreed to create a banking union, completing the economic and monetary union, and allowing for centralised application of EU-wide rules for banks in the euro area (and any non-euro Member States that would want to join). The new regulatory framework with common rules for banks in all 28 Member States, set out in a single rulebook, is the foundation of the banking union. Common rules will help to prevent bank crises in the first place (in particular Capital Requirements Directive and Regulation MEMO/13/690)  and, if banks do end up in difficulty, set out a common framework to manage the process, including a means to wind them down in an orderly way (Directive on Bank Recovery and Resolution (BRRD) MEMO/14/297). Common rules will also ensure that all EU savers are guaranteed that their deposits up to €100 000 (per depositor/ per bank) are protected at all times and everywhere in the EU (Directive on Deposit Guarantee Scheme –DGS MEMO/14/296). The banking union ensures the common implementation of those rules in the Eurozone. First, as of November 2014, the European Central Bank (ECB) will be the supervisor of all 6000 banks in the euro area in the framework of the Single Supervisory Mechanism (MEMO/13/780). In order to ensure that the ECB has a clear view of the situation of banks it supervises from the outset, a comprehensive assessment of banks’ financial health is currently being carried out. Second, in the rare cases when banks fail despite stronger supervision, the recently adopted Single Resolution Mechanism (SRM) (MEMO/14/295) will allow bank resolution to be managed more effectively through a Single Resolution Board (SRB) and a Single Resolution Fund (SRF). If a bank fails, the SRM with clear decision-making rules for cross-border banks and highly experienced staff will be much more effective in carrying out resolutions than the existing patchwork of national resolution authorities.”