Bankia : launches professional training and certification plan for 5,500 employees for early phase-in of MiFID II

• The plan will be carried out during the first half of the year and is addressed to directors, assistant directors, managers and technical staff
• Each professional will earn two accreditations: professional certification as Expert in Financial Advising, granted by IEAF, and the university degree of Specialist in Banking and Financial Advising, from CUNEF

Bankia is launching a professional training and certification plan for 5,500 of its employees with a view to early phase-in of the European Union's MiFID II Directive, scheduled to come into force in January 2018.

The directive aims to ensure that the professionals who provide information and advice on investment services to clients are properly qualified, in order to offer better protection to investors and greater transparency in the contracting of financial products.

The training will earn each participating employee two certifications: professional certification as Expert in Financial Advising, granted by the Spanish Institute of Financial Analysts (IEAF), and a university degree of Specialist in Banking and Financial Advising, granted by the CUNEF college of financial studies (Colegio Universitario de Estudios Financieros).

The plan is addressed, amongst other groups, to directors, assistant directors, managers and technical staff, all of whose responsibilities include providing advice and/or information on financial products to clients.

The courses will be given by the Escuela de Formación de la Fundación de Estudios Financieros (Training School of the Financial Studies Foundation) during the first half of 2017. They are scheduled to begin this month and run until July, five months before MiFID II comes into force, and will involve 114 training hours organised in 12 modules.

The 2-phase programme consists of 24 weeks of preparation, followed by a 6-week certification phase to prepare for the certification examination. The courses combine class time and online training.

These employees will join the more than 450 professionals of the bank previously certified for MiFID II, basically financial advisors in the Plus+ offices (specialised in advising) and private banking managers, who during 2016 took courses to obtain the European Financial Advisor (EFA) certificate from the (European Financial Planning Association (EFPA). These degrees certify professional capacity to carry out financial management and advisory tasks for personal or private banking customers and in financial services for individual customers.

As a result, once this phase of the training plan has concluded, approximately 6,000 employees will have independent certifications that accredit across Europe their professional qualification to provide advice and/or information on financial services to retail customers.

For Bankia's training director José Ignacio Mora 'this initiative shows Bankia's commitment to excellence in financial advice, in order to comply with the highest levels of transparency, efficiency and customer protection'. The bank is in this way 'responding to the needs of its customers, who demand that their advisors have comprehensive and continuous training to enhance the financial services they provide', Mora adds.

Since the MiFID II regulation offers a 4-year period from its entry into force for qualification of financial professionals, the Bankia training plan will be completed in 2018, when it will be extended to the rest of the employees in the bank's commercial network who need to be accredited to perform their jobs.

Once that 4-year period ends, professionals in the sector who are not adequately certified to MiFID II will not be able to provide advice and information on financial products to retail customers, so the training programme for earning these certificates also reflects Bankia's commitment to enhancing the employability of these professionals.