The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) is to focus on supervisory convergence issues next year, according to its 2017 Work Programme.
The programme sets out ESMA’s future priorities and areas of focus in support of its mission to enhance investor protection and promote stable and orderly financial markets.
The programme reflects the shift in focus of ESMA’s work from building the single rulebook towards ensuring its consistent application across the European Union, as outlined in its 2016-2020 Strategic Orientation.
The key areas of focus under ESMA’s activities of supervisory convergence, assessing risks, single rulebook and direct supervision will be: converging supervisory practices on the implementation of MiFIDII/MiFIR; focusing on data quality; Level 2 work on the Benchmarks Regulation and on various initiatives under the umbrella of the Capital Markets Union; and directly supervising credit rating agencies (CRA) and trade repositories (TR), with a particular focus on their ancillary activities given the trend of combining ancillary and core services.
Steven Maijoor (pictured), ESMA chair, says: “ESMA will focus on the implementation of MiFID II/MiFIR in 2017, this reflects our shift as a supervisory authority from building the single rulebook to ensuring the application of that rulebook through convergent supervisory practices across the European Union.
“Other areas of focus include ensuring the quality of data, finalising the single rulebook in the area of benchmarks and continuing to improve and develop our capabilities in the direct supervision of credit rating agencies and trade repositories.
“These activities will contribute to ESMA meeting its responsibilities in enhancing investor protection and promoting stable and orderly markets.”
