Esma downplays fears of LEI logjam

Applications have risen sharply in recent months, but concerns Asia is lagging behind other jurisdictions remain

A senior European regulator has defended the mechanism by which counterparties caught by new trading rules next year must register for a formal legal entity identifier, arguing that criticisms of the process as costly and overly bureaucratic are wide of the mark.

Any entity in scope of Europe’s revised Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (Mifid II) and its accompanying regulation, which comes into force on January 3, will be forbidden to trade with a counterparty that does not have an LE