MFA Responds to HM Treasury Regarding Consultation on Transposition of MiFID II

MFA provided comments to Her Majesty's Treasury ("HMT") in response to consultation on the HMT publication, Transposition of the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive II ("MiFID II").

MFA voiced its general support for HMT's "copy-out" approach to drafting the UK-implementing legislation, and for other aspects of MiFID II implementation. According to MFA, however, certain aspects of MiFID II would benefit from additional guidance and greater detail being incorporated into the UK-implementing legislation because that would help to ensure that the regime is implemented effectively and consistently across all relevant market participants.

With respect to position limits and reporting, MFA supported (i) excluding any two persons in a third country with no link to the UK from the position limits regime, (ii) an explicit mechanism for the delegated reporting of position data, (iii) the implementation of clear confidentiality safeguards and (iv) clarification on the reporting of end clients' positions. Additionally, MFA discussed upholding the principle of nondiscrimination with respect to the MiFID II organized trading facility, among other things.

See: MFA Comment Letter.