Article 124 [Prohibition of Privileged Access to Financial Institutions]

Article 124 TFEU prohibits the privileged access of EU institutions and national public entities to financial institutions as a way to complete the Article 123 TFEU prohibition. The logic of these two rules is the same: forcing the MS to go to the capital markets to find funds for their financial needs. Market discipline compels the MS to apply orthodox budgetary policies that help the European Central Bank (ECB) to apply a monetary policy guided by its price stability objective. As with the monetary financing prohibition, the ban of privileged access aims to encourage the MS to follow a sound budgetary policy, not allowing the monetary financing of public deficits or the privileged access by public authorities to the financial markets to lead to excessively high levels of debts or excessive MS deficits.