The book charts the course and the history of how the regulation of financial services has evolved looking particularly at data protection. It addresses concepts like integration theory, the behaviour of nation-states when they attempt to forge geo-political unions and the implications and outcomes of state interaction in regulatory matters. Unlike many other General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) publications in the market, it contains useful analyses of the GDPR but it does so in a very practical and informative way. It recognises the perspectives of various interests including academics and commercial organisations and presents the subject in a compelling, historical and easy to digest manner, starting with the challenges of integration that the EU has faced. It then charts the course of general financial services regulation, focusing on the history of data protection legislation in the EU and drawing out the real challenges that are presented by the legislative framework. There is an in-depth analysis of the GDPR with examples of the derogations and areas where individual states are still able to derogate. The book ends with suggestions for the application and further review of the GDPR. In the presentation of the history of data protection regulation, the author shows the influence of the contrasting narratives of privacy rights versus the desire to enable commercial activity to thrive. There are examples of how the failure to harmonise the regulation of data processing has left individual EU states able to assert national influence so that commercial organisations have been left with a legal framework that impedes the development of a single market even with the increasing importance of big data and processing in financial services. The book then highlights key provisions of the GDPR that are designed to address some of the challenges by centralising interpretation, defining flow-downs and harmonising enforcement and regulatory provisions across the EU.