ESMA Sounds a Death-knell for Cross-border Exchange Access, in Conflict with UK Legislation and the MiFIR.

This legal analysis examines recent informal interpretative guidance from ESMA on the ability, under MiFID II, of non-EU members of EU exchanges to provide direct electronic access to those exchanges for their customers. We highlight the conflicts between ESMA's guidance and the provisions of the MiFIR, and compare ESMA's position with the contrary view taken by the UK and other EU legislators, before concluding with some thoughts on how this contradiction might be resolved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]