MNB announces new market oversight strategy

Image: Jessica Fejos

The new market oversight strategy focuses on consumer protection, sustainability considerations and responses to the challenges of digitalization, MNB said in a statement.

In order to increase the resilience of financial markets, the strategy aims to strengthen the compliance areas of the institutions supervised by MNB, in addition to ensuring a stable, strong capital position.

MNB said it would be necessary to create guarantee systems similar to those already in place in deposit and investor protection for the entire insurance sector as well as voluntary pension and health care funds.

The new strategy calls for extending the range of certified consumer-friendly products and says consumers should be able to compare products of the same type through the development of the consumer-friendly product comparison pages of the NBH and consistent market oversight requirements relating to product calculators on the market.

MNB argued for setting equal conditions for existing financial service providers and those newly entering the market for products and services of the same type.

MNB said it pays special attention to cross-border financial operations and that the elimination of conflicts of interest among financial market and insurance intermediaries is also an important goal.

MNB noted that market oversight and regulatory systems must prepare for the digital future as more and more IT systems supporting business processes come under the horizon of the NBH. Therefore, it is a fundamental goal to modernize the regulatory environment related to IT technologies and to develop the supervisory methodologies.

Transaction-based filtering systems, designed to prevent money-laundering and the financing of terrorism, must be strengthened at market participants. Under the new market oversight strategy, the MNB should take an active role in the development of the international and domestic regulatory environment of the financial system.