The 'Vandal Banker' video was posted on YouTube and launched at a meeting of the socialists' financial and economic network on 7 April.
The move represents the latest attempt by the PES to harness new technologies in communicating with Europe's citizens.
Launching the campaign last week, Austrian State Secretary for Finance Andreas Schneider, who chairs the Party of European Socialists' financial and economic network, said "the vandal banker in our video clip ends up having to clean up his mess. With a financial transaction tax, we can ensure that he will be joined by his colleagues".
Asked by EurActiv to respond to the campaign, a representative of European banks said the industry would prefer not to get involved with "party political issues" of such a "sensitive"nature.
A tax on cross-border currency trading has been considered on many occasions by politicians worldwide after it was first proposed in 1971 by the economist James Tobin. The tax named after him, the so-called 'Tobin tax', is mainly aimed at limiting short-term currency speculation.
At the request of the September G20 summit, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) is considering a financial transactions tax as a way of rescuing defaulting financial institutions and removing the debt burden from the taxpayers' shoulders.
The PES clip, which shows a banker arrogantly spraying graffiti on a wall, was published ahead of the socialists' European Action Day for a Financial Transaction Tax on 24 April.
Brandishing a spray can, the banker in the 57 second-long video daubs the words 'if you cause 3,000 billion euros' worth of damage, what should the fine be?' on the side of a building.
Later he is pictured wiping the message off the wall, indicating that bankers should be forced to mend the damage caused by the financial crisis.
For YouYube, the 'Vandal Banker' video is just the latest in a series of collaborations on EU affairs dating back to last June's elections, when the online broadcaster teamed up with TV channel Euronews to launch a service encouraging candidates, constituents and experts "to engage in a dialogue through online video" (EurActiv 06/05/09).
The PES will hold its action day just 24 hours before the IMF presents the findings of a major report on taxing financial transactions - requested by G20 leaders at their summit in Pittsburgh last September- at its spring gathering in Washington (25-26 April).
