The European Commission on Sunday welcomed the results of the EU-wide stress tests carried out by the European Banking Authority (EBA) and the European Central Bank (ECB) separately.

"These robust exercises, unprecedented in scale and among the most stringent worldwide, provide a high level of transparency on EU banks' balance sheet and data exposure as of end-2013 and allow the identification and redress of any remaining vulnerabilities" the Commission said in a statement.

The statement added that the assessments represented an important step towards an operational Single Supervisory Mechanism, which is a key component of the EU's planned banking union.

"Yet there is no room for complacency," it said.

"Rigorous and timely follow-up actions to the results of the exercises will be absolutely crucial," it added.

According to the results published by the EBA, 24 European banks have failed stress tests of their finances while the ECB said 25 banks had failed its test.

The ECB's figure is higher than the EBA's because Spain's Liberbank passed the EBA stress test but failed the ECB's Asset Quality Review.