Notices for publication in the OJ nº T-427/20 of Tribunal General de la Unión Europea, August 07, 2020

• Resolution Date: August 07, 2020
• Issuing Organization: Tribunal General de la Unión Europea
• Decision Number: T-427/20

Action brought on 8 July 2020 - Max Heinr.Sutor v SRB

(Case T-427/20)

Language of the case: German

Parties

Applicant: Max Heinr.Sutor OHG (Hamburg, Germany) (represented by: A. Glos, H. Nemeczek and T. Kreft, lawyers)

Defendant: Single Resolution Board (SRB)

Form of order sought

The applicant claims that the Court should:

annul the decision of the Single Resolution Board of 15 April 2020 on contributions levied in advance to the Single Resolution Fund for the year 2020 (Ref.: SRB/ES/2020/24 - 1405146-2020-JB), in so far as it concerns the applicant;

order the SRB to pay the costs of the proceedings.

Pleas in law and main arguments

In support of the action, the applicant relies on ten pleas in law.

1. First plea in law, alleging an infringement of Article 5(1)(e) of Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2015/63 ¹ in that the client funds administered by the applicant in a fiduciary capacity were not excluded from the calculation of the contribution levied in advance to the Single Resolution Fund for the year 2020.

2. Second plea in law, alleging an infringement of the second subparagraph of Article 70(2)(b) of Regulation (EU) No 806/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council, ² in conjunction with Article 103(7) of Directive 2014/59/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council, ³ because the decision infringes the principle of proportionality in that it fixes a bank levy increased 200 times on the sole basis of the - risk-free - fiduciary liabilities shown by the applicant in the balance sheet.

3. Third plea in law, alleging an infringement of the principle of equal treatment, in that the decision treats the applicant unequally in relation to credit institutions whose national accounting standards do not require disclosure of fiduciary liabilities or which prepare their accounts in accordance with IFRS, and investment firms which manage clients' funds, without any objective justification.

4. Fourth plea in law, alleging an infringement of Article 16 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (‘the Charter’) in that the decision encroaches on entrepreneurial freedom, since the inclusion of the risk-free fiduciary liabilities in the basis of assessment leads to an increase in the applicant’s bank levy for the year 2020 by a factor of 200, without there being any justification for such encroachment.

5. Fifth plea in law, alleging an infringement of Article 49 in conjunction with Article 54 TFEU, in that the...