(fra kommisjonsforordningen)

(1) In accordance with Article 42(1) of the Regulation (EU) 2024/3005, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) is to charge proportionate fees to ESG rating providers to fully cover ESMA’s necessary expenditure relating to the supervision of ESG rating providers and the reimbursement of any costs that the competent authorities might incur when carrying out tasks pursuant to that Regulation, and in particular as a result of any delegation of tasks in accordance with Article 43 of that Regulation.

(2) To fully cover ESMA’s expenditures relating to the supervision of ESG rating providers, ESMA should determine the annual supervisory fees on the basis of the annual estimate of all direct costs necessary for the supervisory tasks performed by ESMA and an appropriate apportionment of ESMA’s fixed and variable overheads. 

(3) To ensure a fair and clear allocation of fees which, at the same time, reflects the actual administrative burden per supervised entity, ESMA should calculate the supervisory fees based on the ESG rating providers’ turnover, since the cost of supervision is higher for larger ESG rating providers than for smaller ones. 

(4) To enable ESMA to dispose in due time of audited turnover data for the estimation of fees due by ESG rating providers to ESMA, the reference year of the audited accounts for the determination of the applicable turnover should be two years prior to the financial year for which ESMA charges fees to the ESG rating provider. 

(5) To facilitate the calculation of the fees by ESMA, ESG rating providers should submit their audited accounts to ESMA by a set deadline. 

(6) The applicable turnover of ESG rating providers is calculated in euros. It is therefore necessary to specify a mechanism for the conversion into euros of revenues generated in other currencies. ESMA should calculate the penalty in case of late payments in accordance with the provisions on default interest set out in Article 99 of the of Regulation (EU, Euratom) 2024/2509 of the European Parliament and of the Council. 

(7) To provide for budgetary certainty for both ESMA and the ESG rating providers concerned, an annual supervisory fee should be charged to ESG rating providers established both in the Union and outside the Union. Annual supervisory fees should not become a burden for small ESG rating providers and new entrants to the ESG rating market. Therefore, the annual supervisory fee should be proportionate and appropriate to the size of the ESG rating providers and to the extent of their supervision. In accordance with Article 5 of Regulation (EU) 2024/3005, a temporary regime has been introduced to facilitate the market entry of small ESG rating providers and support the development of existing small ESG rating providers already operating in the Union. For the duration of that temporary regime, ESMA should charge small ESG rating providers annual supervisory fee proportional to their applicable turnover. As Article 5 of Regulation (EU) 2024/3005 does not require the same extent of supervision of small ESG rating providers as in the case of other entities and given the purpose to facilitate access to the market for small ESG rating providers, it is necessary to introduce a cap on fees measured as a share of applicable turnover. 

(8) In line with Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2019/7154 , fees charged to ESG rating providers are to be set at a level that ensures that the full cost of services provided by ESMA is covered and a deficit is avoided, but at the same time avoids the accumulation of a significant surplus. Where a significant positive or negative budget result becomes recurrent, the level of the fees may be revised. 

(9) To further simplify the fee management, and to ensure ESMA has the necessary funds to carry out its planned supervisory activities, annual supervisory fees should be paid in a single instalment during the first three months of the calendar year for which such fees are due. Annual supervisory fees should not be reimbursed. 

(10) ESMA should charge an authorisation fee to ESG rating providers established in the Union to reflect the costs for processing the application for authorisation. The complexity of an application for authorisation and costs associated with its assessment increase where an ESG rating provider envisages endorsing ESG ratings or envisages using outsourcing. Therefore, the authorisation fee should be increased by a fee related to the endorsement or outsourcing accordingly. The processing costs also depend to a large extent on the size of the applicant ESG rating providers. Therefore, the authorisation fee for a small ESG rating provider where it ceases to be categorised as a small ESG rating provider, or three years after its registration, whichever occurs first, should be less than the general fixed authorisation fee. 

(11) ESG rating providers established outside the Union applying for registration under equivalence regime in accordance with Article 10 of Regulation (EU) 2024/3005 should pay a registration fee whose amount should reflect the estimated ESMA’s effort for the assessment of such registration applications. Given that the registration under equivalence regime is a simpler process than the authorisation and given the fact that ESG rating providers established outside the Union are already subject to the authorisation and supervision outside of the Union, the registration fee should be accordingly much lower than in the case of the authorisation. ESG rating providers established outside the Union that apply for recognition in accordance with Article 12 of Regulation (EU) 2024/3005 should pay fees to cover their recognition and annual supervisory costs. In that regard, ESMA’s necessary expenditure relates to the recognition of such ESG rating providers established outside the Union which follows a similar procedure as the one applicable to the authorisation of ESG rating providers established in the Union, and ESMA’s expenditure necessary for the supervision of recognised ESG rating providers. 

(12) Small ESG rating providers notifying ESMA in order to be registered in accordance with Article 5 of Regulation (EU) 2024/3005 should be charged a fixed registration fee. Registered small ESG rating providers that can be categorised as micro ESG rating providers as referred to in Article 3(1) of Directive 2013/34/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council should be exempted from paying annual supervisory fees throughout the whole period they benefit from the temporary regime. 

(13) In view of possible future developments, the amounts of authorisation, recognition and registration fees might be reviewed and updated as necessary. 

(14) Competent authorities incur costs when carrying out tasks delegated to them by ESMA and when providing assistance to ESMA in the other cases specified in Regulation (EU) 2024/3005. The fees to be charged by ESMA to ESG rating providers should also cover those costs. To avoid that competent authorities incur loss or realise profit from carrying out delegated tasks or from assisting ESMA, ESMA should only reimburse the actual costs incurred by that national competent authority,