Opinion of the European Central Bank of 6 April 2001 at the request of the Council of the European Union concerning a Commission proposal for a Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council amending Regulation (EC, Euratom) No 58/97 concerning structural business statistics (CON/2001/3)
Date: 2001-04-06
Institutions: European Central Bank
Subjects: EU statistics, company structure, economic statistics, financial institution

3.5.2001

EN

Official Journal of the European Communities

C 131/5

EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK

OPINION OF THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK

of 6 April 2001

at the request of the Council of the European Union concerning a Commission proposal for a
Regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council amending Regulation (EC, Euratom)
No 58/97 concerning structural business statistics

(CON/2001/3)

(2001/C 131/03)

from the Council of

1. On 27 February 2001, the European Central Bank (ECB)
received a request
the European
Union for an ECB opinion on a draft regulation of the
European Parliament and of the Council amending Regu-
lation (EC, Euratom) No 58/97 concerning structural
business statistics (hereinafter referred to as the (cid:145)draft Regu-
lation(cid:146)).

financial

system and

structural developments and on the stability of the banking
and
to
improvements in macroeconomic statistics. The ECB notes
that there is only a limited overlap between these statistics
and the statistics collected by the ECB mainly for monetary
policy purposes.

that may

contribute

2. The ECB’s competence to deliver an opinion is based on
the Treaty establishing the European
Article 105(4) of
the collection,
Community. A common framework for
transmission and evaluation of Community
compilation,
statistics on the structure, activity and performance of
institutions (MFIs)
business related to monetary financial
and
insurance
except
intermediaries,
corporations and pension funds falls within the ECB’s field
of statistical competencies as laid down in Article 5 of the
Protocol on the Statute of the European System of Central
Banks and the European Central Bank. In accordance with
the first sentence of Article 17.5 of the Rules of Procedure
of the European Central Bank, this ECB opinion has been
adopted by the Governing Council of the ECB.

financial

other

5. The ECB takes note of

the ECB understands that

the statement made in the
explanatory memorandum that the additional burden on
enterprises and national data providers caused by the
these statistics is limited or non-existent.
collection of
there are Member
However,
States that do not have the full set of required data at
their disposal. Besides this, the ECB would like to point
out
statistics concerning Annex 6
(module on credit institutions) may indeed cause, in some
countries, an increase in the reporting burden on national
central banks as data providers. The ECB understands that
the abovementioned statistical requirements are without
prejudice to the timely and accurate provision of data to
the ECB for the exercise of its tasks.

the additional

that

3. The objective of the draft Regulation is to complement the
existing regulaton concerning structural business statistics
with two additional sector-specific annexes on credit insti-
in Annex 1, a common
tutions and pensions funds and,
module for annual
to extend the
statistics,
coverage of the horizontal module to activities related to
financial
and
introduces two additional
financial auxiliaries. Finally,
variables in the area of environment
to Annex 2 on a
detailed module for structural statistics in industry.

intermediation services, pension funds

structural

it

6. The ECB notes that the revision of the Council Regulation
four
will
in due course be followed by proposals for
Commission Regulations on the implementation of
the
regulation. The ECB expects to be consulted on these
aspects.

7. This ECB opinion shall be published in the Official Journal of

the European Communities.

Done at Frankfurt am Main on 6 April 2001.

4. The ECB welcomes the adoption of the draft Regulation as
an important step towards the provision of high quality
statistics on financial services. The ECB has an interest in
the timely availability of indicators that may shed light on

The President of the ECB

Willem F. DUISENBERG