FRANKFURT-The European Central Bank's effort to hire staff for its single European banking supervisor is progressing well, and most of the recruiting campaign should be completed by summer, the head of the supervisor said Tuesday. "Most of the recruiting campaign should be completed before the summer break, and I am confident that most of the staff will be in Frankfurt in the ECB before November 2014," Daniele Nouy, who chairs the supervisory board of the new supervisor, said in a speech in Frankfurt. So far the ECB has received around 8,000 applications for the new supervisor, Ms. Nouy added. Europe has embarked on a quest to harmonize its banking practices through a union to break the toxic link between banks and governments and restore credibility to a European banking sector bruised by a near four-year sovereign-debt crisis. For its part, the ECB has agreed to take on the task of supervising Europe's largest banks directly, and several thousand others indirectly, starting in November. The ECB assumed the role in part to help restore trust in Europe's banking sector and spur lending to the economy, after a financial crisis and recession in the euro zone saddled many lenders with bad loans. As a part of the effort, the ECB must hire around 1,000 supervisors and support staff. Europe also needs to harmonize its banking supervisory practices, Ms. Nouy added. "There are still many, probably too many national options in the Capital Requirements Directive IV," the latest supervisory framework for the financial services industry in the European Union, Ms. Nouy said in her speech. Write to Christopher Lawton at Christopher.Lawton@wsj.com

Source