On the ground in Paris: Europe's T+1 transition moves from planning to execution

Bronze scallop shell marker embedded in a cobblestone path, symbolizing the Camino de Santiago pilgrimage route.

ThoughtTree Lab travelled to Paris on 3 July for the release of the EU T+1 Industry Committee's second market-wide readiness survey — an event hosted by Banque de France and sponsored by Euroclear, and a useful marker of just how far, and how fast, the European industry has moved on the road to the 11 October 2027 deadline.

The headline numbers, drawn from the Committee's survey with The ValueExchange, tell their own story: 83% of firms are now actively preparing for T+1, and 58% have a formal implementation plan in place — more than double the level reported six months ago. Firms that have taken no action at all have shrunk to just 2%. As Independent Chair Giovanni Sabatini put it in the accompanying press release, the question is no longer whether Europe moves to T+1, but how the industry gets there together, "as one market."

That sense of collective responsibility ran through the panel discussion that followed. Progress is real but uneven: large infrastructures, custodians and major intermediaries are well advanced, while asset managers, pension funds and smaller firms are still finalising plans, some not until early 2027. Panellists flagged the shift in what's now keeping people up at night — less the interpretation of the T+1 rules themselves, more the dependencies between counterparties, intermediaries and technology providers that firms don't fully control.

Funding forecasting tools came in for particular attention, with one panellist noting that the share of respondents unsure of their approach to transaction types has fallen sharply since the first survey. Corporate actions surfaced as an under-discussed risk area: automation of buyer protection and tighter instruction deadlines were both raised as places where the market still has work to do, alongside a call to stretch the operational day as far as possible to capture more same-day settlement.

Asset managers came in for close attention too. One panellist, closer to the fund side of the market, pointed out that the evolution of the fund dealing cycle has been a live topic ever since the US moved to T+1: European funds sitting on T+3 are increasingly shortening voluntarily to T+2, less because anyone is mandating it and more to close a cash misalignment that opens up once the underlying market settles faster than the fund itself. It's not a uniform shift — it depends heavily on a fund's profile — but the direction of travel is clear. The flip side, she added, is outreach: smaller asset managers are harder to reach and often carry a heavier relative cost of change, which is why the Committee is looking at tailoring its checklist specifically for smaller players rather than assuming one size fits all.

CSDs, for their part, described their evolving role in the run-up to go-live: building out testing environments, facilitating market-wide test windows opening from June 2027, and feeding into the ECSDA dashboard that will track central bank operational timelines — including for non-T2S markets — as the industry moves into coordinated testing. A new optional early-morning settlement window across European CSDs was also discussed as a way of easing funding-gap pressure created by uncoordinated liquidity events. The consistent theme: testing is now the critical phase, and readiness will ultimately be judged collectively, not firm by firm.

That framing carried through to ESMA's session. Chair Verena Ross set out three concrete asks for firms: respond to ESMA's consultation on allocations and confirmations guidelines before it closes; move beyond programme mobilisation into concrete delivery — system upgrades, static data clean-up, agreed procedures with counterparties; and build coordinated 2027 testing into implementation plans now, rather than treating it as a final check. She was direct that automation “is not an operational enhancement… it is an absolute precondition.” Ross confirmed the European Commission's endorsement of ESMA's final report on the CSDR settlement discipline RTS is now imminent, and flagged new allocations and confirmations requirements taking effect from 7 December 2026.

Her closing line stayed with us: Europe's T+1 transition is "not a solo sprint, but it is a relay" — every participant has to be ready to take the baton, run their leg, and pass it on.

ThoughtTree Lab provides editorial and communications support to the EU T+1 Industry Committee.