COVID-19 and CCP Risk Management Frameworks

After the market turmoil caused by the COVID-19 pandemic in March and April 2020, the ISDA Clearing Member Committee analyzed how central counterparty (CCP) risk management frameworks reacted to the crisis, based on feedback from CCPs.

The results show CCPs dealt with the crisis well, managing record volumes while most of their staff worked from home. In total, there were three member defaults or close-outs, none of which threatened financial stability. This reflects a more stable financial system overall: clearing members are much better capitalized and hold more liquidity compared to the last crisis.

However, some issues did emerge. Procyclical initial margin requirements exacerbated market stress at certain points. Clearing members also lacked timely information about backtesting breaches and procyclicality in margin models. The paper makes recommendations to address both of those points.

Episode 56: Countdown to Treasury Clearing

With less than nine months to go until the first US Treasury clearing mandates come into force, BlackRock’s Tyler Wellensiek and BNY’s Nate Wuerffel discuss industry progress. Please view this page via Chrome to access the recording.

Response to Eurosystem Consultation on Appia

On April 22, ISDA responded to the Eurosystem consultation on the Appia roadmap. ISDA broadly supports the roadmap and its high level principles, while recommending that the principle on market access and integration should be expanded to explicitly address interoperability...