Supervision release 1 February 2018 – 6/2018

Updates to FIN-FSA regulations and guidelines due to national transposition of MiFID II

As a result of the national transposition of the Directive on markets in financial instruments II (2014/65/EU, hereinafter MiFID II), the Financial Supervisory Authority (FIN-FSA) has amended the following regulations and guidelines:

  • Regulations and guidelines 1/2012 Outsourcing in supervised entities belonging to the financial sector;
  • Regulations and guidelines 13/2013 (in Finnish) Public insider register of market participants, employee pension insurance companies and management companies;
  • Regulations and guidelines 14/2013 (in Finnish) Trading participants in third countries; and
  • Regulations and guidelines 3/2014 (in Finnish) Authorisations, registrations and notifications.

The updated regulations and guidelines were issued on 23 January 2018 and they enter into force on 1 February 2018.

The FIN-FSA is examining whether the national transposition of MiFID II also necessitates amendments to other regulations and guidelines, including the following:

  • Regulations and guidelines 15/2013 Marketing of financial services and products;
  • Standard 1.4 Assessment of fitness and propriety (fit & proper); and
  • Standard RA1.4 Reporting of fitness and propriety to the Financial Supervision Authority.

The FIN-FSA will inform of any further updates, if necessary. The Commission Delegated Regulations 2017/565/EU, 2017/1943/EU and 2017/1946/EU as well as the Commission Implementing Regulation 2017/1945/EU adopted on the basis of MiFID II are directly binding on the Member States. In case of discrepancies, the Delegated Regulations and the Implementing Regulation will take precedence over the FIN-FSA regulations and guidelines and standards specified in the second paragraph above.

In the context of the amendments due to MiFID II, reference to the European Banking Authority’s (EBA) Recommendations on outsourcing to cloud service providers (EBA/REC/2017/03) was added to the FIN-FSA regulations and guidelines 1/2012 Outsourcing in supervised entities belonging to the financial sector. The EBA Recommendations were published on 20 December 2017 and they will apply from 1 July 2018. The FIN-FSA recommends that supervised entities comply with the EBA Recommendations on 1 July 2018, at the latest.

As regards the FIN-FSA regulations and guidelines 13/2013 Public insider register of market participants, employee pension insurance companies and management companies, chapter 7 concerning the registrar’s obligation to annually submit to the FIN-FSA a report on the keeping of the insider register was repealed. By virtue of the transitional provisions of the Investment Services Act (747/2012), the Act on Trading in Financial Instruments (1070/2017), the Act on the Book-Entry System and Securities Settlement (348/2017) and the Investment Funds Act (48/1999), an annual report on the keeping of the insider register need no longer be submitted for 2017.

For further information, please contact:

Henrik Kallio, Legal Adviser, tel. +358 9 183 5210, email henrik.kallio(at)fiva.fi

Should you have any questions relating to the updated regulations and guidelines, please send your email enquiries to MiFIDquestions(at)fiva.fi.

Annexes