1.Financial counterparties and non-financial counterparties that are subject to the clearing obligation under Title II of Regulation (EU) No 648/2012 shall conclude transactions with other such financial counterparties or other such non-financial counterparties in derivatives pertaining to a class of derivative that has been declared subject to the trading obligation in accordance with Article 32 and listed in the register referred to in Article 34 only on:
(d)third-country trading venues, provided that the Commission has adopted a decision in accordance with paragraph 4 and provided that the third country provides for an effective equivalent system for the recognition of trading venues authorised under Directive 2014/65/EU to admit to trading or trade derivatives declared subject to a trading obligation in that third country on a non-exclusive basis.
ESMA shall regularly monitor the activity in derivatives which have not been declared subject to the trading obligation as described in paragraph 1 in order to identify cases where a particular class of contracts may pose systemic risk and to prevent regulatory arbitrage between derivative transactions subject to the trading obligation and derivative transactions which are not subject to the trading obligation.
2a.Transactions in derivatives that are exempt from or not subject to the clearing obligation under Title II of Regulation (EU) No 648/2012 shall not be subject to the trading obligation.
3.Derivatives declared subject to the trading obligation pursuant to paragraph 1 shall be eligible to be admitted to trading on a regulated market or to trade on any trading venue as referred to in paragraph 1 on a non-exclusive and non-discriminatory basis.
4.The Commission may, in accordance with the examination procedure referred to in Article 51(2) adopt decisions determining that the legal and supervisory framework of a third country ensures that a trading venue authorised in that third country complies with legally binding requirements which are equivalent to the requirements for the trading venues referred to in paragraph 1(a), (b) or (c) of this Article, resulting from this Regulation, Directive 2014/65/EU, and Regulation (EU) No 596/2014, and which are subject to effective supervision and enforcement in that third country.
Those decisions shall be for the sole purpose of determining eligibility as a trading venue for derivatives subject to the trading obligation.
The legal and supervisory framework of a third country is considered to have equivalent effect where that framework fulfils all the following conditions:
(b)trading venues have clear and transparent rules so that derivatives are capable of being traded in a fair, orderly and efficient manner, and are freely negotiable;
A decision of the Commission under this paragraph may be limited to a category or categories of trading venues. In that case, a third-country trading venue is only included in paragraph 1(d) if it falls within a category covered by the Commission’s decision.
5.In order to ensure consistent application of this Article, ESMA shall develop draft regulatory technical standards to specify the types of contracts referred to in paragraph 2 which have a direct, substantial and foreseeable effect within the Union and the cases where the trading obligation is necessary or appropriate to prevent the evasion of any provision of this Regulation.
ESMA shall submit those draft regulatory technical standards to the Commission by 3 July 2015.
Power is delegated to the Commission to adopt the regulatory technical standards referred to in the first subparagraph in accordance with Articles 10 to 14 of Regulation (EU) No 1095/2010.
Where possible and appropriate, the regulatory technical standards referred to in this paragraph shall be identical to those adopted under Article 4(4) of Regulation (EU) No 648/2012.