The European Parliament (EP) has today published an official statement by Markus Ferber (European Parliament Rapporteur for MiFID II), on behalf of the MiFID II negotiation team, accepting the one-year delay of the entry into force of MiFID II in exchange for a swift finalisation of level 2 measures by the European Commission.
In the statement, Ferber says the Commission and ESMA “need to come up with a clear roadmap on the implementation work and especially for setting up the IT-systems.” He adds that he expects the EP to be informed regularly and comprehensively about any progress in the implementation work.
In a letter to Commissioner Hill, Ferber and Roberto Gualtieri, MEP, say they are “open to considering a wholesale delay of the application of MiFID II – MiFIR, on two conditions: firstly that the level 2 measures foreseen in these pieces of legislation are adopted by the Commission as soon as possible”; secondly, “that, if the delay is agreed, then the Commission will report regularly to Parliament on the progress towards implementation”. We note that one demand of the European Parliament is that the commodity position limits regime be amended so that deliverable supply is used for all months, rather than just the spot month. This is in direct opposition to the views of FIA Europe members, who are supportive of ESMA’s latest approach that deliverable supply only be used for the spot month and that open interest be used for all other months.
Ferber has also sent a letter to Commissioner Hill, copying in ESMA, DG FISMA and the Luxembourg Presidency of the EU, setting out remaining concerns with MiFID II that have yet to be addressed in a satisfactory manner by ESMA. They include: position limits, non-equity transparency, ancillary exemptions and package transactions.
QCCP deadline extended
Separately, the European Banking Committee of the European Commission voted earlier this week to extend the transitional period for equivalence recognition of non-EU CCPs, which was due to expire on 15 December 2015. The Commission will soon adopt the implementing act which will change the deadline date to 15 June 2016.
