Carlo Comporti named next ESMA chair, starts 1 Nov. 2026

• Council of the European Union confirmed the appointment in Brussels on 9 Oct. 2026.
• Carlo Comporti will take up the ESMA chair on 1 Nov. 2026.
• Verena Ross said she will leave after five years as ESMA chair.

Action

The European Securities and Markets Authority said Carlo Comporti has been appointed as its next chair. The Council of the European Union confirmed the appointment at its meeting in Brussels on 9 Oct. 2026.

Carlo Comporti named next ESMA chair, starts 1 Nov. 2026

Comporti will take up the position on 1 Nov. 2026.

Respondents

Verena Ross is the current ESMA chair. She said it had been a pleasure to welcome Carlo as the new chair of ESMA.

Ross said Comporti brings decades of experience in European financial markets regulation and knows ESMA well. She also said she had led ESMA as chair for the last five years.

Comporti said he was honoured by the role and thanked the members of the Board, the European Council and the European Parliament for their trust. He said he looks forward to working with them, the European Commission, the European Central Bank and other authorities and stakeholders across the financial sector.

Background

Before his appointment, Comporti was a commissioner at CONSOB since February 2022. He was also a member of ESMA's Board of Supervisors and Management Board, chair of its Digital Finance Standing Committee, and a member of the IOSCO Board, where he chaired the Audit and Finance Committee.

He was CEO of Promontory Italy and COO of Promontory Europe, a business unit of IBM Consulting, from 2011 to 2022. Before that, he was Directeur Général of Promontory France and Secretary General of the Committee of European Securities Regulators from 2008. He played a key role in the transition from CESR to ESMA in 2010 and 2011.