October 30, 2013

CFTC Announces Mutual Acceptance of Approved Legal Entity Identifiers

Washington, DC – The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) announced in a Notice posted on the CFTC.gov website on October 30, 2013, that registered entities and swap counterparties subject to CFTC swap data recordkeeping and reporting regulations concerning Legal Entity Identifiers (LEIs) can now comply with those regulations by using any LEI issued by an LEI provider endorsed by the Regulatory Oversight Committee (ROC) of the global LEI system. This includes the CFTC Interim Compliant Identifiers (CICIs) issued by the CICI Utility operated by DTCC-SWIFT, the provider of LEIs designated by CFTC.

The Notice was posted by the CFTC’s Chief Information Officer as provided in the CFTC’s Amended Order Designating the Provider of Legal Entity Identifiers to be Used in Recordkeeping and Swap Data Reporting Pursuant to the CFTC’s Regulations issued on June 7, 2013 (Amended Order). To view the Amended Order, please see Related Link.

The Amended Order provided that, after the ROC adopted standards for approval of LEIs issued by pre-Local Operating Units (pre-LOUs) endorsed by the ROC as part of the global LEI system, and also endorsed CICIs issued by the CICI Utility as globally acceptable, registered entities and swap counterparties subject to CFTC rules would be able to comply with LEI requirements by using either CICIs or other LEIs endorsed by the ROC. The Amended Order made the authorization for use of other endorsed LEIs effective upon publication by the Chief Information Officer of a Notice that the ROC had taken these actions. As stated in the Notice posted today, the ROC has now done this.

This means that, as of October 30, registered entities and swap counterparties may comply with CFTC LEI rules by continuing to use CICIs, or by using other LEI codes endorsed by the ROC as globally acceptable. The list of LEIs currently endorsed by the ROC as globally acceptable can be found at www.leiroc.org/publications/gls/lou_20131003.pdf.

The Commission’s regulations requiring use of LEIs can be found at 17 CFR § 45.6, 77 Fed. Reg. 2136, 2204 (Jan. 13, 2012), and 17 CFR § 46.4, 77 Fed. Reg. 35200, 35229 (June 12, 2012).

Last Updated: October 30, 2013