We work with national supervisors to make the banking system in Europe safe and sound. In this section you can find out more about our practices, which banks we supervise and what measures we have at our disposal. The supervisory priorities set out our focus areas for the year ahead. They are defined annually but can be reviewed at any time if this is justified by risk developments. The supervisory priorities are based on our assessment of the key risks and vulnerabilities faced by supervised institutions. We directly supervise the largest banks in the participating countries, in close cooperation with the national supervisors. They also supervise the smaller banks in their countries. We use stress tests to assess how well banks can cope with financial and economic shocks. They help to identify banks’ vulnerabilities and to address them early on in our supervisory dialogue with banks. Reliable and comparable data are the basis of our work. They inform our subsequent decisions and actions. To ensure transparency we also regularly publish our aggregated supervisory banking statistics. European and national supervisors work together when they directly supervise significant banks. One of the main forms of cooperation are Joint Supervisory Teams (JSTs). They carry out the daily supervisory work and foster a common supervisory culture and consistent supervision.