Next Stop St. Petersburg

Back in 2009, in the wake of the financial Armageddon, world leaders pledged in their G20 commitment in Pittsburghthat all standardised OTC derivative contracts should be traded on a platform and centrally cleared by the end of 2012.

Fast forward four years and the next G20 summit takes place in St. Petersburg, Russia at the end of this week – the first meeting since the 2012 deadline. Global leaders plan to review the progress made in financial markets and, in advance of the big day, a number of weighty documents have been published:

• BIS / IOSCO – the policy framework for margin requirements for non-centrally cleared derivatives.
• BIS – a report on the macroeconomic impact assessment of OTC derivatives regulatory reforms
• National regulators (including CFTC, ESMA and others) – a report on cross-border implementation of OTC derivatives reforms
• ESMA – advice to the European Commission on equivalence of non-European derivatives rules
• and last but not least the FSB with its sixth progress report on OTC derivatives reforms implementation.

The European Council sees good progress and their strategy for combating the crisis is bearing fruit. But despite any gain, regulation and compliance are certainly set to remain on the agenda for some time yet.