On 16 May 2022, the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) published a final report on the review of the MiFID II framework on best execution reports by investment firms. The final report follows a consultation paper that the ESMA published last September seeking stakeholders’ technical input on proposals for possible improvements to the best execution regime. During the consultation period the European Commission published proposals that included deleting both Article 27(3) (i.e., the Level 1 basis for the reporting obligation for venues) and Article 27(10)(a) of MiFID II (i.e., the empowerment for ESMA to develop draft technical standards) and therefore the final report now published does not deal with this topic but rather only with best execution reporting requirements for investment firms.
The final report makes a number of proposals which are set out in section 2 and include:
- Enhancing the RTS 28 (Commission Delegated Regulation 2017/576/EU) reports’ quality of information (inter alia, by proposing to delete a specific reporting obligation for firms on the features of executed orders which has not proven effective under the current reporting framework)
- Facilitating the use of RTS 28 reports, for example, via the suggestion that firms are required to publish the reports’ quantitative information in the simple CSV format to facilitate end-users’ access and comparison of this data.
- Potential changes to legislation (Article 27(6) of MiFID II – level 1) and thereafter consequential changes to RTS 28.
The final report will be shared with the European Commission so that it may inform its analysis on the adequacy of the MiFID II best execution reporting obligations, and to any subsequent determinations on the retention of the regime and how it could possibly change.