This common system, which will support EU banks in their reporting exercise to both the EBA and the ECB, supersedes the second version published in March 2012 and aims at providing a better understanding of the links between the two different reporting frameworks of the ECB and the EBA, while creating synergies between datasets that were originally designed for different purposes.

The common classification system consists of two elements: (i) a bridging manual that links the ECB's monetary (BSI), interest rate (MIR) and securities holdings statistics requirements (SHS) to the supervisory reporting templates (mainly FINREP, COREP and large exposures) of the EBA ITS on supervisory reporting; and (ii) a relational database designed to help reporting agents and other users to identify similarities and differences between data needed by the ECB for statistical purposes and data for financial supervisors in the context of the EBA framework. Exclusively for the analytical purposes of this database, the ECB's statistical reporting templates have been modelled on the EBA's Data Point Modelling framework (DPM).

The third edition of the classification system follows the endorsement of the Implementing Technical Standards (ITS) on supervisory reporting by the European Commission on 16 April 2014, (due to be published in the EU Official Journal by mid-June) and aims to help all interested parties in their preparation in view of the new requirements for supervisory reporting under the CRD IV/CRR framework. The publication also takes into account requirements stemming from the recent ECB Regulation on securities holdings statistics and a series of ECB regulations recast since September 2013 concerning, in particular, balance sheet items and interest rates statistics and thereby also touching upon amendments triggered by the adoption of the European System of National and Regional Accounts (ESA2010).

The classification system was prepared by the Joint Expert Group on Reconciliation of credit institutions' statistical and supervisory reporting requirements (JEGR), established by the European System of Central Banks' (ESCB) Statistics Committee, the Financial Stability Committee and the EBA.