The European Parliament has finalised the delay of a year to the start of MiFID II, from 3 January 2017 to 3 January 2018, as announced in this press release. The Parliament voted by 502 to 158 in favour with 6 abstentions. This follows many months of discussion by different institutions as to how to implement the delay. 

The delay has been expected for some time, and most in the market have assumed it will be approved some for weeks. In the energy and commodity sector however, there is still a great deal of uncertainty as to the effect of MiFID II, since the final version of the Ancillary Activity test, as defined by Regulatory Technical  Standard 20, has still not been adopted, with ESMA “passing back” the definition of key details to the European Commission. While the position limits rules will apply to all, many market participants need the details of the test to establish whether they must set up a MiFID regulated entity, which would be subject to the majority of the rules.