FIA hosted three hours of virtual programming at its first-ever digital conference on June 23, bringing the global cleared derivatives industry together to discuss key issues.
"Resilient industries learn from times of crisis and pivot quickly to make improvements," said FIA President and CEO Walt Lukken in his opening remarks. "That will be the focus of the next three days of IDX-Virtual: What are the lessons learned from recent market volatility and how do we adjust as an industry to make us stronger?"
Topics at FIA's IDX-V conference included a deep dive into the European regulatory environment, a panel discussion on how derivatives exchanges are handling record volume and volatility, and an exploration of "lessons learned" from the global response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
More than 750 people registered to attend the online event. The day’s program highlights included:
· Verena Ross, the executive director of the European Securities and Markets Authority, discussed key market infrastructure issues and current regulatory priorities in a Q&A with FIA's Walt Lukken. Their wide-ranging discussion touched on lessons learned from the pandemic as well as current policy issues such as position limits, CCP issues and the sustainability agenda in Europe.
· Exchange leaders discussed the resilience of cleared derivatives markets. Stephane Boujnah, CEO and chairman of the managing board for Euronext, noted that cleared derivatives exchanges thrived in part because of their nature as transparent, regulated venues that can provide "the most reliable and most liquid quotes" to participants. However, exchange leaders did raise several areas of potential improvements that emerged over the past several months including the levels of margin increase and settlement issues including give-ups and trade breaks.
· A discussion focused on trading trends explored the impact of the crisis on clients and how derivatives markets may evolve across the year as we move past the initial impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
FIA's IDX-V conference will run from June 23 to 25, and replaces FIA's annual International Derivatives Expo conference which was cancelled because of public health concerns. Registration is currently closed, but recordings of all IDX-V panels as well as analysis and commentary from FIA staff will be available early next week at FIA.org/IDX.
