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On March 20, the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the UK’s Prudential Regulatory Authority (PRA) separately published guidance on steps for firms to take to identify key workers in the financial services industry (as, exceptionally during this crisis period while schools are closed, the children of such key workers may continue to attend UK schools).…
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On March 24, a draft copy of the Over the Counter Derivatives, Central Counterparties and Trade Repositories (Amendment etc. and Transitional Provision) (EU Exit) Regulations 2020 (the Regulations) was published and laid before Parliament with an explanatory memorandum.…
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On March 20, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) published a statement setting forth its approach to mitigate the impact of COVID-19 on the implementation of the tick-size regime for systematic internalizers (SIs) in EU financial markets under the Markets in Financial Instruments Regulation (MiFIR) and the Investment Firms Regulation (IFR) (the Statement).…
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On March 20, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) issued a statement to clarify how credit institutions and investment firms can handle the issue of recording telephone conversations under the revised Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID II) during the continuing COVID-19 pandemic (the Statement).…
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On March 12, the Bank of England (BoE) published a discussion paper on central bank digital currency (CBDC), focussing on its opportunities, challenges and design (the Paper). In conjunction with publishing this Paper, the BoE updated its CBDC webpage.…
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On March 11, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published the following new webpages on the Securities Financing Transactions (SFTR):

  1. an overview of SFTR (available here);
  2. an overview of the EU SFTR reporting obligations (available here); and
  3. a non-exhaustive library for EU and UK SFTR links and information (available here).

…
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On March 17, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published a new webpage with information on its COVID-19 response.

The FCA notes that it is monitoring COVID-19 and is prepared to take any necessary steps to ensure customers are protected and markets continue to function well. The FCA is in regular contact with firms to assess their current position and expects them to take reasonable steps to ensure they are prepared to meet the challenges COVID-19 poses to customers and staff.…
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On March 17, the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) published a statement on short selling bans and reporting (the Statement).

The Statement explains that, under the Short Selling Regulation (SSR), EU regulators and the FCA have the power to apply short- or long-term bans on short sales in shares and certain other financial instruments.…
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On March 19, 2020, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) published a public statement regarding the reporting requirements and registration of EU trade repositories (TR) under the Securities Finance Transactions Regulation (SFTR) in light of the recent adverse developments of the COVID-19 pandemic (the Public Statement).…
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