EU RIS Trilogues – six things you may have missed last month

1. EIOPA’s benchmarks will not be published

Last month we wrote:

" The co-legislators agreed to take forward the European Commission’s (the Commission) dual approach proposal, i.e. using EU supervisory benchmarks under the Insurance Distribution Directive (IDD) and peer group benchmarking under MiFID II, UCITS and AIFMD. Firms must also assess whether total costs and charges are justified and proportionate. "

We now know that the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority’s (EIOPA) benchmarks themselves will not be published. Only the methodology will be made public.

2. Peer group bench-marking: “a certain level of cross-border scope to avoid market fragmentation”

In December, it wasn’t clear what role national-level benchmarking would play. The Commission and Council were in favour of an EU-wide scope, but Parliament had suggested a national approach.

It now seems that peer groups will have “a certain level of cross-border scope to avoid market fragmentation”, but not necessarily EU-wide (instead limited to Member States where the financial instrument or comparable products are distributed).

Level 2 measures will specify product governance requirements relating to peer-group construction, including criteria for eligible instruments, representativeness of samples, and fallback assessments where no peer group can be established.

3. Member States will not retain the ability to impose stricter inducements rules at the national level

They may, however, continue to introduce full or partial inducement bans under MiFID. The Council’s revised inducements test includes a requirement to provide “tangible benefits” (shifting from “quality enhancement services”), which is now framed through the lens of proportionality, linking inducements to the value of the product and the level of service provided.

4. No best interest test

We noted in our previous commentary on customer journey:

“The core suitability rules will be broadly maintained. However, those providing advice will no longer be required to assess a client’s investment knowledge and experience for non-complex and cost-efficient products.”

We can now add that the proposed best-interest test has been deleted.

5. PRIIPs: the voluntary personalisation tool remains

Despite Council and Commission opposition to the PRIIPs online comparator and the voluntary personalisation tool, the voluntary personalisation tool has been retained. The Commission, EP and Council agreed to draft a joint political statement at the technical level in support of the online comparator tool, subject to a feasibility and cost assessment.

There is some industry concern about how burdensome these tools could be on firms, even though the personalisation tool is voluntary.

A reference to sustainability will be included at Level 1, although its precise implications remain to be clarified.

6. Talks resume on 19 January

It’s been confirmed: technical trilogues start again on 19 January 2026.

As a reminder, it is anticipated that the RIS text will be published in the Official Journal by the end of H1 2026. If the final rules were published in the EU’s Official Journal by the end of H1 2026, Member States would have to transpose by the end of H1 2028 and the earliest the RIS could apply would be the end of 2028. Under the same assumptions, the majority of the PRIIPs changes would apply end of 2027.

Interested to know more?

In our December EU RIS View, we examined all of these changes and more. It’s still worth a read if you want to know more about this latest round of trilogues. Our RIS Hub page also provides earlier background.