Financial Markets: more transparency and less speculation

The European Union will have new and tougher standards on financial market transactions from January 2018. The European Parliament adopted the new Directives on Markets for Financial Instruments (MiFID II) today. "The MiFID is the cornerstone of Europe’s post-crisis financial markets regulation, which is why it should enter into force as quickly as possible", said Markus Ferber MEP who is the European Parliament Rapporteur on MiFID II.

"Unfortunately we are almost a year behind schedule. I regret that because of the slow work of the European Securities Markets Authority, ESMA, and the European Commission, key elements, such as reigning in high frequency trading and putting food speculation to an end, are still not in force. However, the delay has become a necessity in order to give market participants and supervisory authorities enough time for implementation. The agreement we have reached now will establish regulatory clarity for market participants and Member States’ authorities alike by extending the deadline for application and transposition by one year", Ferber said.