French Finance Minister: 2010 MiFID revision an opportunity to improve transparency
23 February 2010
Christine Lagarde met with key professionals from the financial services sector to discuss France’s position on the imminent MiFID review. She said the increased regulation of the financial system is at the heart of the G20 agenda and that the MiFID review should embrace the G20’s goals.
Christine Lagarde, Minister of Economy, Industry and Employment, has met with Fleuriot Pierre, President of Credit Suisse France and former head of the Commission des Opérations de Bourse, Olivier Poupart-Lafarge and Jean Pierre Hellebuyck, members of the College of the Autorité des Marchés financiers (AMF) in order to prepare France’s position in view of the revision of European Directive Markets in Financial Instruments planned for 2010.
Increased regulation of the financial system is at the heart of the G20 agenda . Christine Lagarde hopes that during the revision of the European Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID), the EU will reach the G20 goals.
"Increased transparency is a priority. I hope that Europe gets a single European infrastructure to collect and disseminate comprehensive information from the market to be used by supervisors, "said Christine Lagarde. She agrees with extending the post-trade transparency requirement in secondary bond market. The revised Directive will also help strengthen the regulation of "dark pools" and "crossing-networks" to maintain a training process of efficient price in Europe. Christine Lagarde finally wants a strengthening of information on issuers trading platforms on which their shares are traded”.
"Without harmonization, the risk is that competition comes to play at the expense of market stability. This can happen if the operating rules imposed on some actors are different, "she said.
The integration of European markets in financial instruments argues strongly for a strengthening of the powers of the European supervisory authorities in these areas.
