FCA PS26/15: What UK MiFIR Changes Mean for Point Nine Clients

The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) has published Policy Statement PS26/15, establishing the final rules and guidance to overhaul and streamline the UK Markets in Financial Instruments Regulation (UK MiFIR) transaction reporting regime.

Currently, UK MiFIR transaction reporting costs industry participants an estimated £493 million per year. The FCA’s streamlined framework removes duplicative, low-value data collections while enhancing data quality for market surveillance and market abuse detection. The regulator estimates that these changes will generate net ongoing annual cost savings of over £100 million across the industry.

Key Regulatory Changes at a Glance

Detailed Summary of Primary Changes

1. Scope Reductions & Instrument Exclusions

• EU-Only Instruments Excluded: The scope of transaction reporting is restricted exclusively to financial instruments tradeable on UK trading venues. Roughly 7 million instruments traded solely on EU venues are removed from UK MiFIR scope, saving firms an estimated £31.5 million annually.
• FX Derivatives Exemption: All FX options, futures, swaps, and forwards are removed from UK MiFIR reporting scope. The FCA will rely on UK EMIR trade reporting for FX market surveillance. (Note: Derivative contracts relating to cryptoassets remain in scope).
• Corporate Events Exemption: Exclusions under MAR 14.2 are broadened to cover corporate event activities, retaining reporting obligations only for IPOs, secondary public offerings, placings, and debt issuance.

2. Field Rationalisation & Simplification

• Field Deletions: Key fields removed from RTS 22 include Notional Currency 2 (Field 45), Option Type (Field 50), Option Exercise Style (Field 53), Maturity Date (Field 54), Delivery Type (Field 56), Transmission of Order Indicator (Field 25), and Indicator Fields 61–65.
• Direct Electronic Access: Introduces a new value (DEAU) in Field 52 (Execution decision within firm) to identify instances where a firm provides Direct Electronic Access.
• FCA FIRDS as a ‘Golden Source’: Investment firms can rely on FCA FIRDS up to T+7 days post-execution to determine reportability. If an instrument (or its underlying) is not in FCA FIRDS by T+7, no reporting obligation applies.

3. Proportional Remediation & Incident Management

• 3-Year Back-Reporting: The default back-reporting window for error corrections drops from 5 years to 3 years, cutting required report resubmissions by one-third. (The FCA retains the power to request up to 5 years only in exceptional, high-severity cases).
• Incident Management Framework: Firms must establish formal, auditable incident management frameworks to triage, remediate, escalate, and log reporting breaches.

Implementation Timelines & Supervisory Flexibility

• 3 August 2026 – 3 April 2028 (Supervisory Flexibility): To enable immediate cost relief, the FCA is applying immediate supervisory flexibility. Firms will not face enforcement or supervisory action if they stop reporting FX derivatives (provided they are reported under UK EMIR) or EU-only instruments prior to the mandatory go-live date.
• October 2026: The FCA will publish draft technical schemas, validation rules, and the new Transaction Reporting User Pack.
• 3 April 2028: Mandatory legal implementation date.

How Point Nine Supports Your Transition

Navigating multi-regime changes can strain operational resources. As a dedicated regulatory reporting specialist, Point Nine provides end-to-end management of these updates across our cloud-native architecture:

• Automated Logic & Schema Updates: Point Nine’s programmatic rules engine is being updated to reflect all RTS 22 field deletions, validation rule relaxations, and code changes (DEAU, NPEX, NOAP) without requiring manual workarounds from your team.
• Cross-Regime Harmonisation: Because Point Nine natively covers both UK MiFIR and UK EMIR, we seamlessly manage the transition of FX derivatives—ensuring full compliance under EMIR while executing early relief under MiFIR.
• Zero-Downtime Adoption: Our clients can take full advantage of the FCA’s supervisory flexibility period starting August 2026 without risking validation errors or rejection spikes.

Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)

Q1: When do the new FCA transaction reporting rules take effect?
The formal compliance date is 3 April 2028. However, the FCA’s supervisory flexibility period is active from 3 August 2026 to 3 April 2028, allowing firms to immediately stop reporting certain out-of-scope transactions (like FX derivatives and EU-only venue instruments).

Q2: Are FX derivatives completely exempt from regulatory reporting?
No. FX derivatives are removed from UK MiFIR transaction reporting, but remain subject to reporting under UK EMIR. To take advantage of supervisory flexibility during the transition period, firms must maintain compliant UK EMIR reporting for these transactions.

Q3: Does the 3-year back-reporting rule change general record-keeping requirements?
No. While the default period for correcting historical transaction reporting errors is reduced from 5 years to 3 years, record-keeping requirements under COBS 11 and SYSC 9 remain set at 5 years.

Q4: What action do Point Nine clients need to take now?
Point Nine handles schema updates, field mapping, and validation rule changes directly within our cloud platform. Clients should connect with their dedicated Point Nine account manager to review their asset class mix and determine their timeline for opting into early supervisory relief.