ESAP - European Single Access Point for financial and non-financial information
On 31 January 2023, the European Parliament published a communication to merge information relevant for capital markets, financial services and sustainable finance.
This exercise, the European Single Access Point (ESAP) is set to improve public access to public information about companies, both financial and non-financial, such as on sustainability, social governance or the workplace diversity of businesses. This in turn should make SMEs more visible and support the green transition through sustainable finance, as investors and other key capital market participants as well as non-governmental organisations would be better informed when making decisions about investments.
In addition to the information made public because of EU law, members of Parliament proposed that from 1 January 2027 ESAP should also make available information that any EU business has made public on a voluntary basis and that each member state should designate at least one entity to collect such information. Information provided voluntarily would have to be uniform in format and comparable in substance, value, use and reliability to that submitted on a mandatory basis. ESAP should not create any new reporting requirements but should instead build upon existing disclosure requirements, procedures and infrastructure stemming from EU legislation.