On 6 December 2023, the Council of the EU issued a press release stating that it had adopted a mandate to start negotiations with the European Parliament on a review of the European Market Infrastructure Regulation (EMIR) and a directive amending Directives 2009/65/EU, 2013/36/EU and (EU) 2019/2034.

The European Commission presented a proposal on 7 December 2022 to review EMIR and amend Directives 2009/65/EU, 2013/36/EU and (EU) 2019/2034. Part of this review sought to require market participants subject to a clearing obligation to clear a portion of the products that have been identified by the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) as of substantial systemic importance through active accounts at EU central counterparties (CCPs).

The Council press release mentions that the main changes it has brought to the proposal include:

  • Strengthening the role of supervisory frameworks, while ensuring an appropriate division of tasks between national authorities establishing coordination at European level, in particular by establishing a Joint Monitoring Mechanism and providing ESMA with a coordination role in cross-border emergency situations.
  • Setting an active account requirement that will require certain financial and non-financial counterparties to have an account at an EU CCP, which includes operational elements such as the ability to handle the counterparty’s transactions at short notice if need be and activity elements so that the account is effectively used. This is ensured by a number of requirements, which have to be fulfilled by these accounts, including requirements for counterparties above a certain threshold to clear trades in the most relevant sub-categories of derivatives of substantial systemic importance defined in terms of class of derivative, size and maturity.

 Also, on 5 December 2023, the European Parliament published a report from the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs regarding the proposal for a regulation of the European Parliament and of the Council amending Regulations (EU) No 648/2012, (EU) No 575/2013 and (EU) 2017/1131 as regards measures to mitigate excessive exposures to third- country central counterparties and improve the efficiency of Union clearing markets.