Derivatives Emir Regulation Reg. n. 648/2012,

DerivativesEmir RegulationReg. n. 648/2012, Paola Lucantoni Financial Market Law and Regulation

Otc derivatives held high level of responsibility in the financial crisis Focus on: the law that governed the otc derivatives’ trade and post-trade activities before the crisis the additional requirements that the new legal frameworks involve a comparison of the new north-American and European regulations

history • Derivatives have been employed for hundreds of years (4000 bC, in Mesopotamia, future trading on commodities) • Since 1970 the volume of derivatives has grown at a staggering rate • Derivatives trading boomed and lead to the creation on the CBOE (Chicago Board Options Exchange)

In 2011, the global market for derivatives amounted to a notional amount of $650 trillion, a value which dwarfs the world GDP of $58.26 trillion (Source: World Bank, World Development Indicators, 2009) • note that the notional amount does not reflect the actual exposure of the market participants. A same asset passed from one party to another will double the the notional amount without actually increasing the global amount of “bets” on the market

ETD versus OTC • Derivatives are separated into two categories: • (I) exchange-traded derivatives ETD • (II) over-the-counter derivatives OTC. • ETDs are the derivatives contracts which are traded using a public exchange, whereas OTC derivatives are contracts traded directly between two parties.

ETD • ETDs are • standardised, • relatively liquid contracts, • which are based on the most common underlyings and • come with pre-defined variable

ETD: the advantage • being centrally settled through a clearinghouse, which concentrates cash-flows by acting as a compulsory counterparty to each part of the contract • Through a system of margins that the clearinghouses require from the parties, the risk that they bear is much reduced • as a result, the counterparty default risk of ETDs is minimal

OTC • are not standardised • and offer a high level of customisation • trading OTC derivatives offers a wider variety of underlyings under more tailored terms and conditions • In terms of volume, OTC derivatives represent an overwhelming majority of the global derivatives trading, accounting for approximately 90 per cent of this colossal market

Role of OTC Derivatives in the crisis • Financial derivatives have been under heavy scrutiny since the late 2000’s financial crisis. • But the financial crisis did not start due to financial derivatives • The spark that set off the crisis was the mortgage crisis, which, in turn, led to the meltdown of many major lending and investment institutions, such as Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual.

CDS: the role in the crisis • At the heart of the blame on derivatives are credit default swaps (CDSs), a product that pays out in case of loan default • The legitimacy of these assets lies in the fact that debt holders might want to mitigate their risk, and, therefore, buy a CDS related to their holding • the access to CDSs allowed a relative spreading of the risk across various actors (e.g. hedge funds) willing to take on risk

domino effect • A large amount of the CDS- trading was purely speculative; some investors bet on the failure of market loans • The large volume of assets traded and interconnectedness of the various financial companies led to what is called “systemic risk”, or the so-called “domino effect”. • Too big to fail: AIG bailout, cost around $182 billion

Analysing derivatives’ role in the crisis • One of the main problems in the days of the financial crisis was the dramatic lack of transparency and liquidity in the market. Market participants did not have access to their peers’ risk exposures, and could, therefore, not properly assess the stability of their counterparties • This was partly due to the inherent characteristics of OTC derivatives, inter alia, the fact that they do not have to be dealt with through a clearinghouse, and that no centralised public record of the companies’ exposures existed.

Bilateral clearing/lack of global information • Most of the CDSs contracts were not cleared through CCPs, but cleared bilaterally, explaining partially why both the regulator and market participants under-estimated the counterparty’s credit risk • Due to the absence of information, financial institutions found it difficult to select reliable counterparties and the markets froze.

conclusion • In conclusion, financial derivatives were not the cause of the financial crisis, but their existence allowed institutions to over-expose themselves, both in terms of volume and in terms of interconnectedness. • High levels of speculation and a lack of transparency led the financial world close to a meltdown. Changes in the infrastructure and legislation will try to prevent this event from happening again in the future.

Costs and benefits • Benefits • add value to social welfare (lenders can extend more credit without having to increase their prudential capital by acquiring CDSs, and, therefore, using more of their capital for its useful pro-cyclical purpose) • Costs • the costs arising from the opacity of the market and the asymmetry of information • the systemic risk stemming from the use of these products

opaque markets • the relation between the dealers and their clients (end-users) is based on unequal grounds due to a common lack of transparency on the pricing of OTC derivatives • their misuse, which can lead to sub-optimal levels of risk-taking, such as over-investment and over-leveraging. The structure of derivatives allows for an investor (or speculator) to bear a large position while requiring little capital • Result: higher systemic risk in the financial markets,

CCPS • ␣an entity that interposes itself between the counterparties to trades, acting as the buyer to every seller and the seller to every buyer␣ • CCPs reduce their own risk by requiring initial margins and margins calls based on daily variations of the value of the derivatives • The role CCPs hold for OTC derivatives is very similar to the role of clearinghouses for ETDs

EMIR (european market infrastructure regulation) • Clearing – CCPs (have to be authorised by their national competent authorities) • Reporting – Trade repositories (centralised registries which preserve various information about the running OTC derivatives contracts) • Risk mitigation – bilateral clearing

Clearing • Two approaches to define which contract should be cleared • Bottom up approach: CCPs can select contracts they would accept too clear; CCPs have an obligation to inform the ESMA which in turn can decide to apply a clearing obligation on this type of contract across the member States. • Top down approach: ESMA and European Systemic Board can determine which currently uncleared derivatives contract should be subject to compulsory clearing.

Clearing • non-financial market participants enjoy an exemption from the clearing obligation. • Nevertheless, if their exposures reach a threshold, defined by the EMSA, and the companies are a systemic risk to the financial markets, the exemption will not be granted

Derivatives Emir Regulation Reg. n. 648/2012,