BANKING AND CONSUMER LAW AGAINST BANKS

Banking law includes those rules that regulate the activities of financial entities, including relationships with customers.

Banking law is the branch of law that studies the rules that regulate the operation of banks and banking activities and, in general, all financial entities.

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Many financial institutions have been approved as banks to submit them to banking regulations, which is why banking and financial law are often referred to together. However, within this field there are also specific rules for each type of entity, whether they are banks, savings banks, credit cooperatives, financing entities, etc.

Matters relating to financial markets and relations between banking entities and customers are also included in this denomination. Thus, we understand banking activity both from the point of view of business or contractual relationships and from the organizational system of entities.

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It is important to bear in mind that banking law as such is not regulated in a specific regulatory body, as is the case of civil , criminal or  labor law . It is not considered one of the classic branches of law. Banking law is traditionally considered part of commercial law, although due to its great relationship with the public sector it is also affected by administrative law regulations.

Even so, we frame banking law within the scope of private law in general, without forgetting its close relationship with public law.

We can classify the set of rules that make up banking law according to different criteria, one of them refers to the scope of the legal system in which it is regulated.

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The financial and banking system is made up of state and regional financial regulations and also, since the entry of Spain into the European Union, by a large amount of community legislation regarding banking and credit institutions in general.

Regarding state regulations, we find different rules that regulate banking activity in Spain. One of the most relevant is la  Law 10/2014, of June 26 , on the organization, supervision and solvency of credit institutions, which regulates not only the Spanish financial system, but also the regulations applicable to credit institutions from other EU Member States and from third countries.

The laws that regulate bank supervisors (such as la  Law 13/1994, of June 1, on the Autonomy of the Bank of Spain ), official credit institutions such as the ICO, the regulations against money laundering, which regulate bank audits and other entities in the banking ecosystem such as the Deposit Guarantee Fund, the Fund for Orderly Bank Restructuring (FROB).

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