8.11 Conclusion

The characteristics that were discussed in this chapter are relevant to the assessment of whether the State aid was appropriate, necessary and proportionate. The conclusion that the State aid was appropriate, necessary and proportionate would result in the temporary approval of the aid. The final approval was dependent on whether the restructuring plan met the three restructuring objectives. As set out in section 8.1, most bank State aid cases were characterised by this two-stage compatibility-assessment.

A remarkable thing about the two-stage compatibility-assessment is that the first and second stage are to some extent overlapping. Admittedly, the two stages focus on different aspects of the bank State aid case: the first stage of the assessment mainly concerns the aid, while the second stage of the assessment mainly concerns the restructuring plan. Nevertheless, some of the relevant characteristics discussed in the present chapter are not only relevant to the first stage of the compatibility-assessment, but also to the second stage. In other words: the relevance of these relevant characteristics transcends the first stage of the compatibility-assessment.

This finding applies in particular to the relevant characteristics discussed in sections 8.6, 8.7 and 8.8. Indeed, the fact that the bank pays an adequate remuneration to the State (i.e. the relevant characteristic discussed in section 8.6) is also relevant in the context of burden-sharing/own contribution (i.e. the second pillar), because the remuneration constitutes an own contribution. In the same vein, exit incentives and behavioural commitments (i.e. the relevant characteristics discussed in section 8.7 and 8.8) are not only relevant in the rescue phase, but also in the restructuring phase. Consequently, they are relevant in the context of compensatory measures (i.e. the third pillar). The overlap between the first and second stage of the compatibility-assessment is also evidenced bythe fact that in several cases, the Commission concluded that the aid could be considered appropriate, necessary and proportionate in light of the restructuring plan (see section 8.9).

The finding that the relevance of these relevant characteristics transcends the first stage of the compatibility-assessment has an important implication: the relevance of these relevant characteristics is unaffected by the 2013 Banking Communication, which – as explained in section 8.1 – largely abolished the two-stage compatibility-assessment.

The present chapter has elaborated on recapitalisation measures and guarantee measures, while asset relief measures are absent in this chapter. This is because the compatibility of asset relief measures is based on a very specific assessment framework: the IAC, which will be discussed in the following chapter.