On 28 September 2021, the European Securities and Markets Authority published a speech given by Natasha Cazenave (Executive Director, ESMA) at the FIA IDX conference.

During the speech Natasha Cazenave shares with the audience ESMA’s priorities around derivatives focussing in particular on the European Supervisory Authority’s recommendations for the review of the MiFID II / MiFIR framework and its work accompanying the transition to risk free rates in the context of the EMIR clearing obligation and the MiFIR derivatives trading obligation.

Among other things when discussing this latter topic Natasha Cazenave mentions that ESMA is now working on its final report which it intends to submit this autumn. She warns that this “is one of the areas where we might end up with some temporary inconsistencies in the scope of the clearing and trading obligations. The process for delivering technical standards, which is not very flexible and relatively long, makes it challenging to perfectly synchronise the transition to the new benchmarks in the EU with the clearing and trading obligations in other jurisdictions.”