The international debate on financial conglomerates is expected to lead to the adoption of a European Directive on conglomerates in the near future. The unique characteristics of the banking and insurance sectors call for such a Directive to be based on preserving the rules that apply to each sector and the specialized agencies charged with supervising each sector. The new directive should ensure that regulation better takes into account that certain conglomerates are structured, it should set forth universal rules for assessing the risks borne by conglomerates, and it should reinforce existing principles for coordination and information-sharing between sectoral supervisors. JEL Classifications : G20, G28