The EU Commission's proposed Regulation on the creation of a European deposit insurance scheme has sparked heated debate. Although the European Deposit Insurance Scheme (EDIS) is initially only intended to apply to the eurozone, in the future it will also apply to Member States who will join the common banking supervision by the ECB. The main component is the creation of a joint Deposit Insurance Fund to provide payouts to depositors and contributions to resolution.

The EU Commission wants to revive the securitisation markets which collapsed during the financial crisis. The stakeholders involved in these markets will be subject inter alia to transparency and due diligence obligations. In addition, the EU Commission wants to create a label for simple, transparent and standardised securitisation (STS securitisation).

The current support for electricity generation by way of photovoltaics is failing to meet the European Union's climate and energy policy targets: It is not resulting in a reduction in carbon dioxide or in lower electricity prices. Neither has security of supply increased. In addition, it has not succeeded in developing an internationally competitive industry for the manufacture of photovoltaic modules in the EU.

In the presence of EU-Commission Guenther Oettinger, cep has presented in Brussels its latest study on competition challenges in the consumer internet industry.

The European Commission wants to bring about stricter compliance with the waste hierarchy by way of measurable objectives for recycling and a limit on landfill for municipal waste. A new "early warning system" will detect if Member States are likely to miss the targets.

The cepDefault-Index 2016 shows that for a large number of eurozone countries - Finland, Slovenia, Italy, Portugal, Cyprus and Greece - falling creditworthiness has become firmly established; a development which sooner or later will result in creditworthiness being lost altogether. Another danger is looming in that many eurozone economies are seeing a diminution of capital stock.

The strategic plan to support energy technology (SET Plan) is to be refocussed on the priorities of the Energy Union. The EU Commission criticises the existing SET Plan for the fact that its technology-specific research support is failing to take sufficient account of the synergies between the various energy technologies. It therefore wants to replace this "technology-specific approach" with an "energy system approach".