Delegation of powers to EU agencies after the short selling ruling

The lawfulness of agencies proliferation in the EU legal order has been evaluated mostly on the basis of some rulings of the EU Court of Justice, albeit rather outdated and subject to varying interpretations. The ‘short selling’ judgment takes a position on this case law and formally endorses it, although it reaches a conclusion that is exactly the opposite of the one that has always been thought as the conclusion that such rulings might lead to. This means that the position of the agencies in the EU institutional framework, the relationship between such agencies and the Commission in the implementation of the EU law, and the reference to Article 114 TFEU as the legal basis for their establishment deserve to be newly examined. Moreover, the ‘short selling’ judgment highlights the limits of the current integration process, the need for a different approach to the analysis of the so-called ‘agencification’ phenomenon and, more generally, of its impact on the evolution of EU governance.