On 11 September 2019, the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) published a consultation paper (CR04/19) recommending that trading venues and their participants synchronise the business clocks used to record the time and date of a reportable event with co-ordinated universal time (UTC).

The proposal follows a recommendation from an earlier IOSCO report published in April 2013 on the consideration of technological challenges to effective market surveillance (FR04/13). Since 2013, various jurisdictions have implemented clock synchronisation requirements in light of increasingly fast trading speed. For example, Article 50 of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive II stipulates that operators of trading venues and their members or participants are required to synchronise the clocks they use for any reportable events with UTC.

IOSCO is of the view that, given the widespread adoption of UTC within the financial industry, it should build on its earlier recommendation by stipulating that where jurisdictions have introduced a synchronisation requirement for business clocks, they should be synchronised to UTC.

The deadline for comments on the consultation is 13 November 2019.

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