On September 15, 2014, the US Commodity Futures Trading Commission's ("CFTC") Divisions of Swap Dealer and Intermediary Oversight ("DSIO") and Market Oversight ("DMO") issued an enabling no-action letter for qualifying swaps trading platforms that are licensed in Australia and overseen by the Australian Securities & Investments Commission ("Australian Licensed Markets"). The enabling no-action letter provides relief for (i) qualifying swaps trading platforms from the swap execution facility registration requirement under section 5h(a)(1) of the Commodity Exchange Act ("CEA"); (ii) parties executing swap transactions on qualifying Australian Licensed Markets from the trade execution requirements under CEA section 2(h)(8); and (iii) swap dealers and major swap participants executing swap transactions on qualifying Australian Licensed Markets from certain requirements under the CFTC's business conduct rules.
The no-action letter requires that an Australian Licensed Market must issue an undertaking that it will comply with the conditions in the letter. Relief will begin after the CFTC's DMO reviews the certification and issues a responsive relief letter.
The conditional no-action letter will expire upon the effective date of any final rules implementing the CFTC's authority to exempt facilities that contain systems of comparable, comprehensive supervision and regulation by appropriate governmental authorities in the home country of the facility.
The full text of the CFTC enabling no-action letter is available at: http://www.cftc.gov/ucm/groups/public/@lrlettergeneral/documents/letter/14-117.pdf
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