The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) has published the following:

  • opinion determining third-country trading venues for the purpose of transparency under MiFID II / MiFIR; and
  • opinion determining third-country trading venues for the purpose of position limits under MiFID II.

ESMA has also published Q&As on MiFID II and MiFIR commodity derivatives topics.

The opinions are intended to help market participants to better understand:

  • under which circumstances transactions executed on non-EU trading venues will be subject to the MiFIR post-trade transparency rules; and
  • whether positions held in contracts traded on non-EU venues will be subject to the MiFID II position limit regime.

The press release that accompanies the opinions states that the opinions clarify that, where non-EU trading venues meet a set of objective criteria, EU market participants concluding transactions on these trading venues:

  • do not have to make those transactions public in the EU under MiFIR; and
  • commodity derivative contracts are not considered as economically equivalent over-the-counter contracts for the purpose of the position limit and position reporting regimes under MiFID II.

View MiFID II: ESMA clarifies transparency and position limit regimes for instruments traded on non-EU trading venues, 31 May 2017