Maria Luis Albuquerque, the European Commissioner for Financial Services, in Washington in April, 2025.Ken Cedeno/Reuters
The European Union’s Financial Services Commissioner is building deeper ties with leaders in Canada’s financial sector as both sides grapple with drumming up investment for key infrastructure, mitigating risks in digital sovereignty and boosting innovation in banking.
Maria Luís Albuquerque, the EU’s Commissioner for Financial Services, met with government officials, banking regulators, pension funds and fintechs in recent days. Canada and Europe are each looking for ways to bolster their economies amid mounting geopolitical tensions, as part of a broader push to realign with like-minded global partners amid the United States’ stark shift to protectionism.
Canada’s “visibility” as a reliable, predictable partner has increased in Europe, she said, even if it has yet to translate to a bump in investment flows.
“Given the relationship between Europe and Canada, which has always been very good, but now is taking further steps in order to become closer, I would expect that to be followed by investment flows in both directions,” she said in an interview. “That would make perfect sense.”
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The commissioner met with Finance Minister François-Philippe Champagne, Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem, Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions head Peter Routledge, Canadian pension funds Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, as well as fintechs MindBridge and FundMore.ai on Monday and Tuesday.
Ms. Albuquerque said Canada and the EU share many perspectives and concerns, and are facing similar challenges.
“We could both benefit from a continued and more intense engagement, because as we move along to pursue our objectives, there will be lots of lessons learned,” she said.
One key goal from Ms. Albuquerque’s meetings with CPPIB and the Caisse, which together manage nearly $1.3-trillion, was to learn about the plans’ mandates and strategies for diversification. The European Commission is looking for successful models it could replicate as it seeks to build a more robust, less fragmented pension system for retirees in its member states, she said.
The savings and investment union is one such initiative, aimed at creating a co-ordinated ecosystem to channel investment capital to urgent EU priorities. A report from former European Central Bank president Mario Draghi estimated Europe will need an extra €750-billion to €800-billion ($1.2-trillion to $1.3-trillion) by 2030.
The plan includes setting up savings and investment accounts to make it easier for citizens to put a portion of their savings – which are often sitting in low-interest bank accounts – into long-term, higher-earning investments.
Decisions about how to invest that pooled capital are likely to have “some home bias,” Ms. Albuquerque said, but the union will place no restrictions on where fund managers can put money to work. That could open the door to a more robust flow of investment between Europe and Canada.
“That would be a diversification that would make perfect sense,” she said.
Canada and the EU each face the tasks of increasing competition in their respective banking markets and helping fintechs enter the financial system and expand their businesses.
Ottawa and OSFI have been adjusting requirements aimed at lowering costs for consumers and businesses, freeing up more capital for loans, and bringing new players into the industry.
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Meanwhile, the approach to global banking regulatory standards is being overhauled as regulators question the impact on competition. In March, the U.S. unveiled potential rule changes to align policy with a 2017 global agreement known as Basel III.
The latest international reforms are aimed at enhancing the amount of capital that banks must hold against financial risks on their balance sheets to help prevent bank failures. U.S. regulators are instead looking at streamlining and easing certain capital requirements to boost lending.
The move has prompted global regulators, including in Canada and the EU, to reassess how they implement the standards to prevent creating an uneven playing field among global banks and limiting their ability to deploy capital for loans and grow profits.
“If you overcalibrate, being overprudent, then you have a problem of competitiveness, so it is about finding the right balance, which is always challenging,” Ms. Albuquerque said.
The commissioner cautioned that governments will need to increase control over key technologies that underpin the economy, particularly in financial services.
Similar to the Canadian banking sector, Europe depends heavily on U.S. technology giants for payments infrastructure, such as Visa Inc. and Mastercard Inc., and cloud and software systems. The region is focused on reducing its reliance on companies from an increasingly protectionist U.S., viewing that dependency as a threat to the economy and security.
The EU has been improving its payments and money transfer systems, promoting European technology providers, and is developing a digital euro – a tokenized version of the EU’s currency – to strengthen Europe’s monetary sovereignty.
“Geopolitics have been challenging, and there is an increased awareness that things can be weaponized in ways that we really didn’t think was possible before,” Ms. Albuquerque said.
“I’m not saying that there is any indication or threat in that direction, but it’s just understanding that if you want to be truly independent, then that also means being able to rely on yourselves for some critical services.”