Maijoor calls for review of third-country equivalence process
Steven Maijoor, the chairman of the European Securities and Markets Authority, called for "an ambitious EMIR review" in a Jan. 23 speech in Amsterdam. One area of focus should be third-country arrangements, he said, adding that ESMA has two main concerns regarding the equivalence mechanism under EMIR, the European regulation that governs exchanges, clearinghouses and other market infrastructure.
The EU is “an island” of equivalence and third-country reliance in a world that has mostly opted for registering individually those infrastructures and market participants that want to do cross-border business, Maijoor said. He added that there are questions over whether the risks of the third-country infrastructures’ activities in the EU are adequately assessed and addressed by the home regulator in the third-country.
