The European Commission has issued a consultation document on post-trade in a Capital Market Union. The European Post-Trade Forum (EPTF), which the Commission created in February 2016, has also published a report that discusses the evolution of the EU post-trade landscape and progress in removing barriers.

The purpose of the consultation is to gather stakeholders’ views about the current state of post-trade markets, the main trends and challenges faced by post-trade services providers and their users, and to determine the existence and scale of remaining or new barriers, the risks associated with such barriers and the best ways to address them. Some barriers are being addressed by ongoing actions (for example the code of conduct on withholding tac procedures) and reviews of existing legislation (for example EMIR). The results of this consultation will feed into future legislative reviews and contribute to the communication on post-trade planned for the end of 2017.

The consultation document itself is divided into two sections:

• EU and global trends, new technologies and competition in post trade; and
• remaining barriers and solutions to remove them.

There are two barriers mentioned in the EPTF report which are not covered in the consultation: (i) inconsistent application of asset segregation rules for securities accounts; and (ii) legal uncertainty as to ownership rights in intermediated securities and third party effects of assignment of claims.

The deadline for comments on the consultation document is 15 November 2017.

View Public consultation on post-trade in a Capital Market Union: dismantling barriers and strategy for the future, 23 August 2017