Summary report 2009

The turmoil on the financial markets has prompted national and international authorities to pay greater attention to deposit protection schemes. In its capacity as a public utility body within which the relevant authorities and financial establishments are jointly represented, the Protection Fund has been closely involved in all the various discussions and work with a view to reinforcing protection for deposits and for investors and has also been following the preparation and implementation of new regulations very closely.

Moreover, during the course of 2009, the Protection Fund continued working on its other operational tasks concerning membership of institutions whose depositors are covered by a guarantee, calculating and collecting their financial contributions, as well as managing its own available financial assets.

Other activities included the various intervention files that had been opened by the Protection Fund's predecessors, namely, the Rediscount and Guarantee Institute (RGI), in its capacity as manager of the previous deposit protection scheme, on the one hand, and the Stock Exchange Companies' Compensation Fund (CIF), which was previously in charge of investor protection, on the other hand.

No intervention procedure had to be arranged in 2009. The Fund therefore posted a positive result of € 76.7 million. Among the main components of this sum are the annual contributions from credit establishments and stockbroking firms, as well as the financial proceeds from investing the reserves. As in previous years, the profit for the financial year was paid in full into the Intervention Reserve, which incorporates all the Fund's means of action. As a result, this Reserve increased from € 802.7 million to € 879.4 million.

In 2010, several modifications to the regulations in force will have to be examined and, if need be, put into practice too. First of all, the European Commission has announced legislative proposals to amend the existing Directives. In addition, the Programme Law of 23 December 2009 introduced a number of measures which, from 2011 onwards, will adapt the way our national guarantee system works and the way in which it is funded. This law also reiterates the decision that the Belgian Government had already taken back in 2008 to raise the deposit protection ceiling to € 100,000, a fixed, standard rate which must be respected by all EU Member States as of 2011.