MEP Influence Index 2024: Top MEPs shaping Capital markets & finance

This analysis measures the influence that Members of the European Parliament are exerting over EU legislation and documents that shape Capital markets & finance. It is part of a series of reports that includes:

This research measures MEPs’ influence through a combination of criteria clustered in the following categories: formal and informal leadership positions, actual legislative work, political network, committee membership and voting behavior.

Disclaimer: this is an assessment based on our team's 15+ years of experience in interpreting relevant EU socio-political data. The aim of this research is not to provide an "absolute truth", but rather to provide an indicative overview. As in any such research, the weighing of the criteria may contain an intrinsic degree of subjectivity, which we aimed to reduce by consulting with a wide range of analysts and practitioners. To read the full methodology, click here.

Key findings:

The top 5 most influential MEPs shaping Capital markets & finance policy are: Stephanie Yon-Courtin (Renew ECON coordinator and most active legislator across the board), Jonas Fernandez (S&D ECON coordinator with a focus on financial tools and risk governance), Pedro Marques (ECON Member and active legislator on banking system), Ludek Niedermayer (ECON Vice-Chair and key legislator on prevention of money laundering or terrorist financing) and Eva Maria Poptcheva (ECON Vice-Chair and active legislator money laundering or terrorist financing). See the full top 10 below.
MEPs from the centre-left groups tend to punch above their weight when it comes to financial regulation, while EPP members are under-represented at the top. Portuguese are leading (proportionally) among national delegations. See the full stats below.

More details on the above findings can be found below.

Important: when tracking influence over EU policies, always bear in mind that while individual MEPs are the visible signatories of initiatives or amendments, they are not operating in an information vacuum. Rather, their views and actions are shaped by bigger political and societal forces / pressures that surround them and that they are networking with.

To understand the full picture, you need to look at the strength of these forces and the direction in which they are pushing and pulling. For example, the chart below shows the level of influence of all MEPs on financial and banking issues, but also the direction in which each of them is working to influence this policy area, e.g. whether they are supporters of regulatory or market approach to the financial sector. Particular attention should be paid to the MEPs who are in the middle, i.e. which have both a fair level of influence and their views are moderate, because in the current (and future) fragmented political landscape, these MEPs (the swing voters) are the ones that make the difference, i.e. their votes are the ones that decide whether a key paragraph is approved or not.

Note: in the chart above, only the names of top MEPs are revealed. To uncover the full picture, contact us at [email protected].

The visual below shows our assessment of the most influential 10 MEPs in this sector (scroll to the right to see the full list).

The list is also available as a table format here.

NB: at least 5 of these top 10 MEPs are likely to come back after the elections. Would you like to know which ones? Contact us at [email protected] for more information on our EP2024 elections info-pack (which includes likely MEPs, Commissioners, policy impact, and much more).

In addition to the top 10 most influential MEPs, we have found it interesting to identify the MEPs from each group that has had the most "personalised" views (i.e. different from those of their political group), on either side of the debate. In other words, who is the most to the right and to the left of their political group on this chart. This is based on the analysis of their voting behavior on a wide range of relevant paragraphs and amendments impacting on this sector. These findings are represented below.

Trends by political group

MEPs from centre-left parties have been proportionally performing better than EPP when it comes to financial regulation during the 9th EP term. Importantly, 8 of the top 10 most influential MEPs on this policy area belong to Renew, S&D or the Greens/EFA, while the EPP is under-represented among the top influencers.

Trends by country

The MEPs from the Northern countries are punching above their weight when it comes to influencing Capital markets & finance policy, especially Danish, Finnish, Irish and Dutch. However, the Portuguese are the most influential proportionally to their size, especially due to the contribution by Pedro Marques.

If you are an institutional or socio-economic stakeholder and you are interested in a workshop about EU elections and/or the functioning of the EU institutions, contact us at [email protected].

Scroll back up to check our research in other sectors.

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