Since our last publication, the British Bankers' Association has published principles to improve access for vulnerable customers and trusted third parties, ESMA has published its final report on guidelines on product governance requirements under the MiFID II Directive.

UK

BBA principles to improve access for vulnerable customers and trusted third parties

The British Bankers' Association (BBA) has published principles to improve customer access. The principles have been developed by the BBA's third party access working party to improve customer access under the vulnerability taskforce principle 5 (easy for friends and family to support). The principles relate to legal instruments for third-party access, including guardianship and intervention orders, court of protection orders, and enduring and lasting powers of attorney. There are six principles, together with detailed guidance on what banks should do to comply with each principle. A number of the UK's biggest high street banks and building societies have agreed to implement the principles and most aim to fully implement the principles by May 2018.

BBA, 2 June 2017

EU

ESMA's final draft technical standards under Benchmarks Regulation

ESMA has published its final report on draft regulatory technical standards (RTS) on co-operation arrangements with third countries under the Regulation on indices used as benchmarks in financial instruments and financial contracts or to measure the performance of investment funds ((EU) 2016/1011) (Benchmarks Regulation). ESMA has submitted the final draft RTS to the Commission, who has three months to decide whether to endorse the technical standards. The draft Commission Delegated Regulation (set out in section 3 of the report), which contains the final draft RTS, states that it will enter into force 20 days after the date of publication in the Official Journal of the EU (OJ).

ESMA, 2 June 2017

ECON draft report on retail financial services action plan

The European Parliament's Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON) has published a draft report on the action plan of the European Commission which contains a motion for a Parliament resolution on the action plan and an explanatory statement from Olle Ludvigsson, the rapporteur.

ECON, 1 June 2017

ESMA final report on product governance guidelines under MiFID II

ESMA has published its final report on guidelines on product governance requirements under the MiFID II Directive. The guidelines, set out in Annex IV to the final report, aim to promote greater convergence in the implementation and application of the MiFID II requirements on product governance. The guidelines mainly address the target market assessment, as this aspect was identified as the most important for ensuring a consistent application of Articles 16(3) and 24(2) of MiFID II and Articles 9 and 10 of the European Commission Delegated Directive supplementing MiFID II.

ESMA, 2 June 2017

European Commission adopts Delegated Regulation on RTS further specifying additional objective criteria relating to liquidity coverage for credit institutions 

The European Commission has adopted a Delegated Regulation (C(2017) 3522) supplementing the Capital Requirements Regulation (Regulation 575/2013) with regard to regulatory technical standards (RTS) further specifying the additional objective criteria for the application of a preferential liquidity outflow or inflow rate for cross-border undrawn credit or liquidity facilities within a group or an institutional protection scheme.

European Commission, 31 May 2017

European Commission proposes amendments to EBA draft RTS on strong customer authentication and common and secure open standards of communication under PSD2

The EBA has published a letter sent to it by the European Commission, in which the Commission states that it intends to amend the draft RTS on strong customer authentication and common and secure open standards of communication under Article 98(4) of the Directive on payment services in the internal market.

EBA, 31 May 2017

ESMA opinion on determining third-country trading venues for purpose of MiFID II position limit regime 

The ESMA has published an opinion on whether commodity derivatives traded on a third-country venue should be considered as traded OTC for the purposes of the position limits regime under the MiFID II Directive.

ESMA, 31 May 2017