Introduction
The European Market Infrastructure Regulation (EMIR) is a European Union regulation – introduced in 2012 with Directive 2012/648 – whose goal is to make the Over The Counter (OTC) derivatives market more stable and transparent as well as to reduce systemic risk.
EMIR affects all market participants of a derivative transaction, and from an applicability perspective its geographical perimeter is not limited to counterparties established in EEA1, but it extends also to:
- Counterparties whose OTC derivative contracts have a direct, substantial, and foreseeable effect within the EEA.
- Non-EEA counterparties entering into OTC derivative contracts with a counterparty established2 in EEA.
EMIR has therefore certain extra-territorial effects whenever there is one of the two EEA nexus indicated above.
1 The European Economic Area (EEA) consists of not only the EU member states (i.e., Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, the Republic of Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden) but also Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and United Kingdom.
2 The term “established” is to be interpreted as “incorporated”, hence EMIR applies whenever the counterparty is legally incorporated in an EEA country and thus not to branches of non-EEA entities located in an EEA country.
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