Recent developments give firms some reasons to celebrate but be prepared for a long engagement With lots of different regulatory benchmark efforts now underway, the industry could be forgiven for not taking a common stance. With IOSCO set to issue final principles in July, ESMA and the EBA are simultaneously consulting on a European set
The new legislative package contains some surprises for those engaged in ‘risky’ trading MiFID II is almost upon us. This month, the Council of the EU agreed their general approach, meaning that the draft of MiFID II/MiFIR is free to advance to the European Parliament. If all goes according to the current plan, the new
Is data protection soon to become the biggest compliance hurdle facing the back office? In an effort to improve the protection offered to consumers, and to harmonise data practices, the EU is currently in the process of passing two pieces of legislation: the Cybercrime Directive and the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Few people have
Risk regulation is a cluster bomb – multiple devices with multiple impacts – but applying uniform risk data principles can save costs in 2013-16 With six months before the 4th Capital Requirements Directive comes into force, many will be asking what technological improvements will be necessary to efficiently manage risk going forward. Before they embark
The sheer scale of the EU regulatory reform agenda means that it is easy to miss key details in new requirements which, viewed in isolation, are not major implementation issues, but viewed in context of the wider reform package can cause significant headaches. The counterparty classification cross-over between EMIR and CRD IV is one of
As JWG noted back in April, during the G-20’s April meeting in Washington tax evasion featured surprisingly prominently amongst the expected items on Basel III implementation. G8 Leaders, as a result of the summit held in Northern Ireland in June, have now committed to publishing ‘action plans’ setting out the concrete steps they will take
The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has been very busy. The outcomes of their recent plenary meeting have been released alongside a small library of guidance documents. The FATF have released guidance on how countries and the private sector should handle the money-laundering risks associated with prepaid cards, mobile payments and digital currencies. After extensive
London Stock Exchange Group has announced the release of the Interim Entity Identifier (IEI). On June 6th, the FCA confirmed its sponsorship of London Stock Exchange as a pre-Local Operating Unit (LOU). LSE will be the only UK based pre-LOU and will allocate a pre-Legal Entity Identifier (LEI) called Interim Entity Identifier (IEI) to legal
It is known that regulators are continually playing catch-up with technological innovation in financial services, whether it’s HFT trading, being addressed in MiFID II, or internet banking in the new Bank Account Directive. Bitcoin, however, is an entirely new kettle of fish. For a start it’s a currency that comes bundled with its own payment
At a recent conference, the International Derivatives Expo in London, David Bailey of the FCA said that his organisation ‘will not look kindly on firms which are not prepared [for EMIR].’ ‘The FCA has been doing numerous road-shows and is speaking to a number of trade associations about buy-side regulatory obligations. We have been answering