ESMA has issued its annual European Common Enforcement Priorities (ECEP) Statement for 2025, outlining ESMA’s and enforcer’s key areas of focus for enforcing issuers’ annual financial reports, including financial and sustainability reporting, European Single Electronic Format (ESEF) reporting and alternative performance measures (APMs). This year’s ECEP focuses on accounting requirements regarding geopolitical risks, segment reporting, materiality considerations and scope and structure for sustainability reporting, and common ESEF filing errors in the statement of cash flows. ESMA urges issuers, auditors, and supervisory boards to uphold high quality corporate reporting practices by ensuring consistency, transparency, and adherence to the applicable reporting frameworks and technical standards.
Alongside the 2025 ECEP, ESMA has published a fact-finding exercise addressing the 2024 corporate sustainability reporting practices by European issuers under the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) Set 1. It focuses on the disclosures related to the double materiality assessment process and its outcomes, aiming to inform enforcement priorities and future regulatory improvements.
These documents aim to support issuers, supervisory bodies, and auditors in improving corporate disclosures, and assist investors in taking better-informed decisions.
