See here for an interesting post on the Broadpeak Partners web site on the topic of wash trades. The post examines the updated version of ICE’s wash trade FAQ, which looks at the prohibition on wash trades in the US.

In Europe REMIT, which outlaws wash trades in the wholesale gas and power markets, is already in force. April 7th will see the final deadline for reporting trade data to ACER, who will shortly afterwards be able to monitor the market for suspicious activity, including wash trades.

July 2016 will also see the introduction of MAR, the Market Abuse Regulation, which extends the existing Market Abuse Directive to many other types of financial instruments as well as related spot commodities. This further outlaws market manipulation and also contains monitoring obligations.

As Broadpeak’s post points out, compliance officers workload is continually increasing in order to monitor internal activity and ensure compliance. In the case of possible wash trades, a combination of pattern matching and intent will need to be considered amongst other things in order to ensure compliance.