The European Union's Investment Services Directive

University of Pennsylvania Journal of International Business Law, Vol. 15, No. 2, Summer 1994

31 Pages Posted: 8 Jun 2010 Last revised: 27 Mar 2011

See all articles by Manning G. Warren

Manning G. Warren

University of Louisville - Louis D. Brandeis School of Law

Date Written: June 7, 1994

Abstract

The EU has become the world’s primary actor in accomplishing multinational regulatory harmony in the field of securities regulation. In its recent adoption of the Investment Services Directive, the EU has completed a critical chapter of its evolving regulatory code for the European capital markets. While the Directive’s multistate licensing scheme, critical to the establishment of an internal market for financial services, was from the beginning based on an uncontested conceptual verity, no similar consensus existed on a number of related controversies that emerged. This article describes the EU’s previous achievements in the field of securities regulation, including the policies underlying the proposal and adoption of the Investment Services Directive. It then surveys the scope and major provisions of the Directive and discusses the more controversial issues that divided the Member States into opposing camps. In its analysis of the Directive’s substantive terms, this article notes several of the Directive’s deficiencies, including the failure to establish minimum commonality in the areas of administrative and judicial remedies for investors, conduct-of-business rules and transactional disclosure. The article concludes by noting that the Directive, despite its limited success in achieving an integrated European market system, represents a remarkable advance in the development of the EU’s multinational securities code.

Keywords: European Union, European Union Investment Services, Directive, securities regulation, European capital markets, international markets, Member States, transaction disclosure

JEL Classification: F00, F01, F02, K2, K20, K22

Suggested Citation

Warren, Manning G., The European Union's Investment Services Directive (June 7, 1994). University of Pennsylvania Journal of International Business Law, Vol. 15, No. 2, Summer 1994, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1621840

Manning G. Warren (Contact Author)

University of Louisville - Louis D. Brandeis School of Law ( email )

Wilson W. Wyatt Hall
Louisville, KY 40292
United States

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