Europe aims for EMIR agreement in five days

 European authorities have confirmed they will aim to reach a final agreement on the European market infrastructure regulation (EMIR) by the end of this month.  

 

European authorities have confirmed they will aim to reach a final agreement on the European market infrastructure regulation (EMIR) by the end of this month. 

The European Parliament, European Commission (EC) and Council of the European Union will meet on 31 January with the intention of finishing discussions on the new derivatives legislation, after their previous 23 January trialogue was postponed. 

The new date follows comments from European internal market and service commissioner Michel Barnier on Tuesday, who stated that EMIR negotiations were on the “home straight”. 

During trialogue discussions, differences between the texts drafted by European Parliament and Council of the European Union are reconciled, with input from the EC. 

EMIR will seek to standardise OTC derivatives where possible so that they can be traded on exchange, centrally cleared and reported to data repositories. 

During previous negotiations, European authorities failed to reach an agreement on the role that securities watchdog the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) would play in authorising and supervising clearing houses under the new rules. 

After the trialogue discussions are complete, securities watchdog the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) will begin writing the accompanying technical standards for EMIR, which are currently due for completion by 30 June. 

The Group of 20, which demanded OTC derivatives reform following the collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008, has stated that it wants the rules to be in place by Q4 2012. 

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