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In the serie of conferences organized by the Journal of Regulation & Compliance (JoRC) on the topic of the Europe of Compliance, Jean-Jacques Daigre presented the general theme of this conference which took place on May 30, 2018 on the Compliance as an opportunity need to be seized by European companies.

By this, he made the general introduction to the conference that Xavier Musca, deputy director general of the Crédit Agricole Group, made on the way in which European companies of global dimension  which had integrated this phenomenon could  contribute to this Europe of Compliance, before Pierre Vimont reacted to these both speeches in a more institutional perspective.  

Read below the restitution of this general presentation by Jean-Jacques Daigre.

In the series of conferences organized by the Journal of Regulation & Compliance (JoRC on the subject of the Europe of Compliance, Pierre Vimont reacted in a "first discussion" at the conference that Xavier Musca, Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Crédit Agricole Group has just done about the way in which European companies of global dimension can do in a European perspective, integrating the new phenomenon of Compliance.

Based entirely on the conference that had just ended, Pierre Vimont emphasized how Europe can develop this perspective of Compliance.

Read the restitution of the Pierre Vimont's speech below.

In the conference cycle organized by the Journal of Regulation & Compliance (JoRC) on the topic of the Europe of Compliance, at the conference of May 30, 2018, Xavier Musca, Deputy Chief Executive Officer of the Crédit Agricole Group expressed how including a European company with a global dimension, whose activity is more specifically banking, integrates the new phenomenon of Compliance!footnote-98.

This reflexion was in continuation of the more general presentation that Jean-Jacques Daigre had just made of the opportunity that Compliance represents, before Pierre Vimont took advantage of the remarks'Xavier Musca by questioning the aptitude of the European institutions to make such a project a reality.

Read below the presentation of Xavier Musca's lecture.

The nature of virtual currency remains uncertain. In any case, the object is very attractive, in particular because its nature, presented as "new", implies that its handling is not regulated.

This allows, in particular for individuals or start up, to issue "tokens" to offer them in exchange of funds, by the "initial coin offerings (ICOs)" technic, tokens acquired by investors, without being banking institutions, or borrowing money , nor issuing capital securities.

Operators demand that this behavior be recognized in its novelty and be recognized as being governed only by the contract and the general principles of loyalty, commitment and information, because what it is not prohibited is permitted while what is not regulated is freely organized by the parties who consent to it.

As media report, the Banking Regulator of China, has just decided otherwise. It has decided that the fundraising by individuals or companies by means of virtual currency will now be banned.

The question is whether other Regulatory Authorities could do the same.

Read below.

Regulation of the digital world, we agree on its necessity, we talk about it a lot but it is difficult to do it.

The stakes are multiple: management of innovation, protection of people, treatment of different sorts of powers, future of the human being, the Politics and the Judge being like a bullet that ricochets between these 4 subjects.

It then rediscovers that the first "regulators" are the Governments and that the first modality of the Regulation Law  is the taxation.

Notably in the digital field and even more so in the face of GAFA.


Indeed, the 4 American companies, Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon, admit the need for rules but propose self-regulation or co-regulation. These would include not only their own behavior, but also those of others, including the fight against terrorism. Maybe, when one is stronger than the States, he should substitute himself for their core business....

Undoubtedly being dispossessed of the regalian, Europe today demands "accounts" to the GAFA in the literal sense of the term. Indeed, the French and German governments will table in September a tax proposal specific to the GAFA, the fruit of which will come back to the countries where they earn their income.

Concerned companies replied that in the tax system everyone has the right to be skilled and to organize at the best, so long as one does not fall into the abuse. In accordance with this legal conception, the French administrative high Court (Conseil d’État) has just recalled it in an important decision to their benefit.

In August 2017, the French Minister of Economy and Finance, Bruno Lemaire, justified  the reiteration of his will to tax them, raising this issue at European level in the name of "distributive justice", the Law being defined as what gives everyone his share. This is a strong but dangerous argument, for while it is true that in the very function of taxation, correlated with public finances, the redistributive function is essential, tax optimization becomes staggering.

In a more convincing and regulatory way, this measure of equity is presented as correlated to the construction of the European digital market. It is an economic conception. To the extent that European taxation is still embryonic, its link with such a construction would make it possible to see in vivo the strength of the tax tool in Regulation Law, more than ever distant from Competition Law.

It is in this context, and because the European Digital Market must be built at forceps, since the GAFA will benefit from it, but also must participate in its construction, that such an investment sharing is justified.

The Olympic Committee has just taken a stand: "sports competition" video games are contrary to the "Olympic values", because of their violence.

Can we do anything else? More or something else?

The case is a gap. Indeed, sports activities are regulated in the most traditional way, by administrative texts, administrative supervision, delegations, judicial control. There are rules, both legal and ethical. The most sophisticated rules have been developed, notably on "permissible violence" and that which is not, for example in the field of boxing or rugby, through the notion of "rules of the game".

Video games are at first sight quite different.

They are regulated by other bodies of rules and other regulators, such as the Regulatory Authority for Online Games, when they are played in the digital space.

But the Regulator of online games does not at first sight have competence to apply the "rules of the game" in the perspective of what sport is and the particular integration of the distinction between permissible violence and inadmissible violence.

Assuming that it extends its competence to that dimension, the fact that the blows carried are only "virtually" should necessarily modify the contour and the application of the rules, transforming this regulator of games into a regulator of sports.

Conversely, assuming that the sports regulators are concerned, it is necessary that the analogy between "game" and "sport" should be strong enough for the extension to take place legitimately.

The criterion that poses the problem is precisely le notion of "violence".

Read more below.

The Internet has created an area of freedom, even libertarian space.

The flood of words is sometimes hateful. Never mind. This would be the price of freedom: it corresponds to the project of those who conceived the Internet, the places of expression and creation, even the worst, and the political and legal culture of the United States, a system in which the freedom of expression has constitutional value.

This in particular allows for the development of ideas spreading so-called "neo-Nazi" thinking, as the Stormfront site has been doing for years.

On August 25, 2017, the private company, Network Solutions that hosts the site and provides it with the domain name terminated hosting and deleted the domain name.

The host also banned the web master from rebuilding the site or transferring it in any way.

This case gives rise to a debate on the rise of extremists in the United States on the one hand and the limit of freedom of expression on the other.

What is here to be noted is the power of a web host in the matter.

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The manager who made the decision found it necessary to justify himself, as a Regulatory Authority would have done, giving grounds for a sanction decision, even though he can avail himself of the general conditions of use that are accepted by the entities that create and operate the sites.

Read more below.