Abstract
Sanctions are an essential element to ensure the effectiveness of the legal system1 as they are second level legal precepts aimed to promote adherence to primary legal precepts (those that define the conduct) through the provision of negative consequences for the offender; therefore, they have the purposes of prevention and repression of illegal behaviours. The recent financial crisis has led to reflection on a few aspects of the financial markets regulation including the adequacy of the regulatory framework of sanctions. Historically, there is a natural trend to tighten sanction regimes as a result of exceptional events, since the South Sea Bubble (terrorism, environmental alarms, financial scandals).2
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Notes
Even before being a guarantee that the legal system is effective, sanctions are the main criterion of the rules being juridical. See N. Bobbio, Sanzione, Noviss. Dig. it., Vol. XVI (Torino: Utet), 1969.
In the last few years, the Italian law system, due to Cirio and Parmalat scandals, saw an exponential growth of the enforcement powers granted to the financial markets watchdogs as well as an evident tightening of the applicable sanctions, mostly through the enactment of Law No. 262 of 28 December 2005, “Rules to protect savings and discipline the financial markets”. The law is the offspring of the emotional wave surrounding notorious scandals (namely Cirio and Parmalat cases), and it is a multifacetedreform: in general, see F. Capriglione, La nuova legge sul risparmio (Padova: Cedam), 2006 and, ivi, for an analysis of the new criminal rules, see M. Sepe, La nuova disciplina dei reati societari e finanziari, for the new profiles of the administrative sanctions, see E. Bani, Le sanzioni amministrative; on the tormented story which led to the enactment of the current law,
see L. Spaventa, “Note su una creatura non nata: il disegno di legge sulla tutela del risparmio”, (2005) Merc. conc. reg., 2, pp. 425–443.
M. Fratini, Le sanzioni delle autorità amministrative indipendenti (Padova: Cedam), 2011;
M. Trimarchi, “Funzione di regolazione e potere sanziona-torio of Autorità indipendenti”, in M. Allena e S. Cimini, “Il potere sanzi-onatorio delle Autorità amministrative indipendenti”, (2013) 26 Dir. ec., no. 82 (extra content only online), p. 85.
M. Clarich, Autorità indipendenti. Bilancio e prospettive di un modello (Bologna: Il Mulino), 2005, 88 ss.
Art. 113 CFA, para. 3, delegates to the Consob the task to identify in a regulation cases and conditions which may allow the issuers to postpone the diffusion to the public of privileged information; Art. 193 CFA states that the Consob will fine the violation of Art. 113 CFA or the regulation created to implement it; see W. Troise Mangoni, Il potere sanzionatorio della Consob, (Milano: Giuffrè), 2012, 91 ss.
On the sanctioning power of the independent authorities as an enforcement tool of the regulation, see E. Bani, Il potere sanzionatorio delle Autorità indipendenti (Torino: Giappichelli), 2000, p. 40. One of the elements which can support the thesis that the sanctions issued by the independent authorities are expedient to the regulation is the discretion allowed to the independent authorities in determining the amount (see E. Bani (2000), p. 45). Trimarchi, “Funzione di regolazione e potere sanzionatorio delle Autorità indipendenti” (above) doubts and stresses the point that the argument is based “on the disputed distinction between administrative discretion, which is assumed to exist in the sanctions issued by the independent authorities, and the judicial discretion, which is assumed to exist — by analogy with the alla punishment — in the sanctions governed by Law 689/1981”. The antitrust area shows the sanctioning model in which the punishing aspect receded most in favour of the regulatory one. The leniency programs of the antitrust law definitely evoke a use of the sanction power as incentive tool and the program constitutes the epiphany of a system which does not set as its main mission that of inflicting a punishment to the wrongdoer. In these cases, the interest in the correct performance of the regulated activities and in respecting the fundamental principles of the sector runs parallel — during the development of the procedure — to the interest in identifying and punish the wrongdoers and sometimes the former prevails over the latter.
F. Capriglione, Intervento pubblico e ordinamento of credito (Milano: Giuffrè), 1978.
M.S. Giannini, Osservazioni sulla disciplina delle funzione creditizia, in Scritti giuridici in onore di Santi Romano (Padova: Cedam), 1940, II, 714 ss. The theory of the credit sector as a sectional system stems from Santi Romano central theory of the coexistence of various legal frameworks at the same time and in the same Nation State. The defining elements of a sectional system were (i) the creation by virtue of law of a cluster of subjects, (ii) the organisation and (iii) the power to create rules. The idea of the credit sector as a sectional system under the 1936 Banking Act, induced some scholars to consider the fines indicated by the Banking Act as disciplinary sanctions. As a practical consequence when Law 689/81 was enacted, its general rules would not have been applicable to the “banking” sanctions, as by virtue of Art. 12 of Law 689/81 the law does not encompass the disciplinary sanctions. Prevailing opinions excluded the idea of construing the supervisor — supervised relationship in hierarchic terms: see, for all,
M. Condemi, Le sanzioni amministrative bancarie e la giurisprudenza della Corte di Appello di Roma, Quaderni di ricerca giuridica della Consulenza legale della Banca d’Italia (Roma), 1991, p. 17.
E. Bani, Il potere sanzionatorio delle Autorità indipendenti, p. 40; C.E. Paliero, “La sanzione amministrativa come moderno strumento di lotta alla criminalità economica” (1993), Riv. Trim. Dir. Pen. Econ., p. 1040;
S. Ceci Iapichino, Le sanzioni amministrative, in E. Galanti, ed., Diritto delle banche e degli intermediari finanziari (Padova: Cedam), 2008, p. 1428.
P. De Biasi, Persuasione e castigo. Le sanzioni amministrative nel TUB e nel TUF (Milano: Giuffrè), 2003, p. 4.
A. Baldassarre, Le sanzioni delle Banca d’Italia, in M. Fratini, (ed.), Le sanzioni delle autorità amministrative indipendenti (Padova: Cedam), 2011, p. 471. The rules which breach causes the issuing of a measure imposing a fine are contained mainly in Art.144, but also in Arts 133, 139 and 140 CBA. The articles deal respectively, with unauthorized use of names, violation of rules on authorization to business or notification require-ments for major bank holdings or CBA rules on banking activity, requirements of the corporate officers and relationships with the Bank of Italy. Illicit acts listed in Art. 144 CBA include (i) unauthorized credit activity performed by co-op banks in favour of non-shareholders, (ii) violation
S. Ceci Iapichino, Le sanzioni amministrative, in P. Ferro Luzzi and G. Castaldi, (eds.), La nuova legge bancaria (Milano: Giuffrè), 1996, p. 2016.
M. Condemi, Commento all’Art. 144 in F. Capriglione, (ed.), Commentario al testo unico delle leggi in materia bancaria e creditizia (Padova: Cedam), 2012, p. 2383.
E. Casetta, Sanzioni amministrative, in Dig. disc. pubbl. (1997). The general principle of the option offered to the wrongdoers to pay a reduced fine provided the subject waives the right to challenge the measure do not apply. Also, the general rules on the recourse of the institution, jointly liable with the wrongdoer for the payment of the fine do not apply. The mandatory recourse of the entity — jointly liable — against the wrongdoer, drifting from the general rules of Law 689/81 where the recourse is just an option, underlines the enhanced personal liability the wrongdoer and the accountability of the management, which cannot pass to the institution the risk of a fine. On the exceptions to the general rules, particularly the procedural ones, see L. Donato, “Il procedimento sanzionatorio delle Autorità indipendenti e le deroghe rispetto alla disciplina generale”, in M. Allena and S. Cimini, eds., Il potere sanzionatorio, p. 113.
G. Pagliari, Profili teorici delle sanzione amministrativa (Padova: Cedam), 1988;
C.E.Paliero and A. Travi, Sanzioni amministrative (voce), in Enc. dir., XVI, (Milano: Giuffrè), 1989.
Contrarian M.A. Sandulli, Le sanzioni amministrative pecuniarie. Principi sostanziali e procedimentali (Napoli: Jovene), 1983, but the position is basically a minority one.
M.A. Cabiddu, “Sanzioni amministrative e principi costituzionali davanti alle autorità indipendenti” (2004) Banca borsa tit. cred., II, p. 257.
A. Baldassarre, Le sanzioni delle Banca d’Italia, in M. Fratini, (ed.), Le sanzioni delle autorità amministrative indipendenti, (Padova: Cedam), 2011, p. 495.
F. Accettella, “L’accordo di Basilea III: contenuti e processo di recepimento all’interno del diritto dell’UE” (2013) Banca, borsa, tit. cred., I, p. 462.
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Bani, E. (2015). The Peculiar Administrative Sanctioning System for the Italian Financial Markets. In: Siclari, D. (eds) Italian Banking and Financial Law. Palgrave Macmillan Studies in Banking and Financial Institutions. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137507624_5
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