Judgment_paragraph 96 · QI and Others v European Commission and European Central Bank (T-868/16)

96It follows that the objective pursued by both Article 123 TFEU and Article 125 TFEU is consistent with that pursued by Article 126 TFEU, which requires Member States to avoid excessive public deficits. That objective is intended to protect not individuals, but the European Union as such, including its Member States, against conduct contrary to the requirement of sound budgetary discipline which could give rise to excessive indebtedness or excessive deficits of certain Member States and thereby jeopardise the economic and financial stability of the European Union as a whole, and the efficient functioning of the single currency (see, to that effect, Opinion of Advocate General Cruz Villalón in Gauweiler and Others, C‑62/14, EU:C:2015:7, points 217 to 219). That assessment applies mutatis mutandis to the prohibition laid down in Article 125 TFEU, which ensures that the Member States remain subject to the logic of the market when they enter into debt, since that ought to prompt them to maintain budgetary discipline, compliance with which contributes at EU level to the attainment of a higher objective, namely maintaining the financial stability of the monetary union (see, to that effect, judgment of 27 November 2012, Pringle, C‑370/12, EU:C:2012:756, paragraphs 135 and 136).