EUROPEAN UNION: Deal to regulate financial markets and products and curb high-frequency trading

Wednesday January 15 2014

Comprehensive rules to govern financial markets were agreed informally by negotiators for Parliament and the Council of Ministers on Tuesday January 14, 2014. These rules are designed to close the loopholes in the existing legislation, ensuring that financial markets are safer as well as more efficient, investors are better protected, speculative commodity trading is curbed and high-frequency trading is regulated.

The new rules will apply to investment firms, market operators and services providing post-trade transparency information in the EU. They are set out in two pieces of legislation, a directly applicable regulation dealing inter alia with transparency and access to trading venues and a directive governing authorisation and organisation of trading venues and investor protection.

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