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The European Union has launched a large-scale project to restructure financial regulation. According to the new concept, the European Markets and Securities Authority (ESMA) is undergoing significant changes, striving to become a single regulator for the entire EU financial sector.

Senior officials, including representatives of the European Commission and the head of the European Central Bank, Christine Lagarde, support this reform. Lagarde stressed the need to create a centralized oversight body, like the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, to harmonize standards and strengthen oversight. Special attention in these changes is being paid to the field of digital assets, where the lack of common rules poses risks to market stability.

The main focus of the reform will be the settlement of the issue of "licensing" of crypto firms. Today, companies have the opportunity to find countries with the most lenient legislation by obtaining permission to operate there throughout the European Union. The new scheme will give ESMA the opportunity to directly verify crypto exchanges, services and related infrastructure, eliminating the possibility of circumvention of the rules.

The European Commission plans to publish a detailed version of the proposal in December this year. The head of ESMA, Verena Ross, has already announced the organization's full readiness for expanded powers and responsibilities that are currently being performed by national regulators in twenty-seven countries, especially in the field of monitoring platforms for trading digital assets and their storage.

The European Union is making an important transition from a distributed model of financial regulation to the formation of a single pan-European regulatory authority based on ESMA. This change aims to eliminate regulatory discrepancies between member states and establish comprehensive control over the rapidly growing digital asset market.