On 1 April 2016, the European Commission’s Delegated Regulation (EU) 2016/467 relating to Solvency II – the European risk-based capital regime – was published into the Official Journal of the EU. This covers the new risk charges imposed on insurers’ equity and debt investment in infrastructure projects. Based on advice from the European Insurance and…
With MiFID II’s implementation date of 3 January 2018 fast approaching, investment firms need to prepare for the changes that will be brought about by the EU’s flagship regulatory policy. All-encompassing in its scope, MiFID II will implement regulatory changes that will impact the trading of all financial instruments. In an attempt to fulfil the…
It has been nearly four years since the implementation of CRR/CRD IV which cover prudential rules for banks, building societies and investment firms with the main aim of reducing the likelihood that these financial institutions will become insolvent. To an extent, this reflects the Basel III rules on capital measurement and capital standards which is…
On 18 July 2016, the FCA produced a consultation paper (CP16/18) outlining suggestions on how to prepare the rulebook for the introduction of PRIIPS. PRIIPS, which is designed to increase transparency of costs, risk and intended market, will take effect on 31 December 2016. It requires each manufacturer and distributor of insurance-based investment products (IIP) or packaged…
On 22 December 2015, ESMA published 10 guidelines on cross-selling practices under MiFID II. However, as noted in our previous article, these guidelines were not released as initially intended by the three European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) – EBA, EIOPA and ESMA. Alongside the guidelines, ESMA put out a press release stating that “in light of…
The sheer number of overlapping regulatory reporting regimes makes compliance difficult. MiFID II, which comes into effect in January 2018, significantly expands the scope of transaction reporting. EMIR, which is a reporting regime for derivative transactions under the EU regulation on OTC derivatives, CCPs and trade repositories, came into effect on 10 April 2014. Reporting…
2016 has added tens of thousands of new regulatory pages to the pile, which has kept us, at JWG, very busy boys and girls. Unlike the last decade, however this year has been about unexpected twists and turns in the road: It’s been a year of MiFID II/R panic, implementation delays, regulators waking up to…
At JWG’s RegTech conference, now less than a month away, our second panel* will bring experts together to discuss the matter of aligning reporting obligations using RegTech to ease the regulatory burden. Panellists confirmed so far include Adedayo Banwo (Legal Counsel at Deutsche Bank, London Branch, former Counsel in the Office of General Counsel at…
Date: April 2016 Dear fellow board members, As the Financial Conduct Authority's acting head has so rightly pointed out, sustainability is the key to pleasing our shareholders and delighting our customers with a global approach to compliance. Since taking the seat which oversees our global compliance function in 2008, I've watched in horror as G20…
In the past month, we’ve celebrated the holiday season and brought in the new year, but there has been no rest for the wicked and regulators have been busy scrambling to meet deadlines and push out new regulatory documents. In the period before Christmas, we witnessed a lot of developments and it’s safe to say…
Last week, the Regulatory Oversight Committee (ROC) published their report on the progress the Legal Entity Identifier (LEI) has made since its proposal in 2011 as a solution to transparency, organisation and risk aggregation in the financial industry. The report is split into five sections: (1) Completion of the Global Legal Entity Identifier System (GLEIS)…
JWG analysis. The Legal Entity Identifier is a top level form of identification, designed so that it can be applied and recognised universally. Essentially, it should provide one unique code for each unique entity that holds data and be able to be applied anywhere in the world. It sounds great doesn’t it? It sounds like…
JWG analysis. With a number of regulatory deadlines looming, we thought we’d remind you of another one – mark January 2017 in your calendars (if you haven’t already) for MiFID II. The aftermath of the recent financial crisis exposed weaknesses within Europe’s current Economic and Monetary Union and highlighted the need to strengthen it. Although…
JWG analysis. Catch phrases, like ‘caveat emptor’, have been the rallying cry of the financial industry for millennia. In 2009, the G20 sought to change the status quo by introducing the notion of global transparency to all markets. After spending billions on the first wave of reporting, we are only now realising how difficult it…
JWG analysis. We’re used to watching our document trackers spin out of control in so-called ‘quiet’ times. As we wrote in January, the last 2 weeks of 2014 year saw global FS regulators pump out over 4,000 pages. These Easter holidays were little better with 2,000 pages of regulatory text released in two weeks. It…
JWG analysis. 60 attendees across the buy and sell-sides came together at Markit’s seminar in Stockholm last month to discuss today’s industry challenges. They concluded that a new focus on establishing a flexible banking operating model to meet both business and regulatory demands for data, processes and standards, is top on their wish list for 2015.…
JWG analysis. As the sun slips back into hibernation, schools reopen and autumn looms, regulators, lawyers, risk specialists, change managers and compliance professionals are returning to their desks. Here at JWG we have been busy tabulating the enormous level of movement in the regulatory space during the summer. For those of you lucky enough to…
JWG analysis. Last week the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) released several key documents including its annual Policy Statement amending certain aspects of the PRA Rulebook. These policy changes are sure to have an impact across all firms that come under the PRA’s regulatory jurisdiction. The PRA has: Amended eight of its Fundamental Rules which replaced its…
JWG analysis. In late October, the European Banking Authority (EBA) released a consultation on the use of the Legal Entity Identifier (LEI) for CRD IV’s risk reporting requirements. Now that the consultation phase has been concluded, firms may only have around 60 days to register LEIs for all their entities that report under CRD IV.…
This time next year, the market is going to be a very different place. No-one knows the complete, consolidated impact of regulation on the market, and many of the parts are still in motion, but the core structure is starting to take shape. In Europe, our research tells us that most institutions are opening 2014…
A big theme present at a big industry data conference earlier this month was how firms were approaching the BCBS’s standards on risk data aggregation as well as the implementation of the regulatory data agenda. With the FSB and the BCBS agreeing that “higher expectations” must be met by G-SIFIs for risk data aggregation and…
Andrew Bailey, the freshly anointed head of the new Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA), gave the strongest indication yet of the approach that would be taken to regulating and supervising systemic insurers alongside banks and major investment firms. Reading not very far between the lines, Bailey also seemed to be outlining the approach the PRA would…
Five years after the crisis started, real change is finally in store. Who is on the naughty and nice lists? In 2012, the industry saw a flurry of financial sector reforms. With over 140,000 pages of regulation produced over the past twenty four months, an ambitious but often discordant global regulatory framework has developed, leaving…
By Sam Tyfield and JWG. Here algo again … Yesterday, ESMA published a notice stating that supervision of automated trading across the EU (in compliance with the ESMA guidelines from 2012) was converging. We found that interesting - a closer look at the BaFin’s rules versus those MiFID II/R creates would appear to show less…
JWG has extracted the following questions from ESMA's Consultation Paper on MiFID/MiFIR Technical Advice. ESMA needs to deliver this advice to the European Commission by December 2014 and is therefore subject to a condensed consultation process for this paper. For more on MiFID/MiFIR see here. Q1. Do you agree with the proposed cumulative conditions to be…
JWG analysis. The new political drive towards tax transparency is landing in money laundering legislation, and complicating an already complex landscape. G8 Leaders, as a result of the summit held in June last year, committed to publishing ‘action plans’ setting out the concrete steps they will take to combat tax evasion. It appears that those…
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…