EU-wide interconnection of insolvency registers

Abstract

A landmark achievement of the freshly adopted revision of the EU Insolvency Regulation (Regulation (EU) 2015/848 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 May 2015 on insolvency proceedings (recast)—hereinafter as “the recast Insolvency Regulation”, OJ L 141 of 5 June 2015, p. 19–72) is without any doubt the establishment of the EU-wide interconnection of national electronic insolvency registers. Once deployed in 2019, the system of interconnection will effectively enhance transparency concerning insolvency proceedings opened within the European Union. The European e-Justice Portal as a central public electronic access point will ensure, by means of a uniform multi-lingual search engine, that relevant data on debtors subject to insolvency proceedings are publicly available to existing or potential creditors, or third parties indirectly affected by those proceedings. The following article tries to make a first summary of the new regime, outlining the scope and structure of the system, putting its evolution in a historical perspective, and highlighting the major discussion points of the legislative procedure leading to its adoption.