MiFID II rebuilt European market conduct after the financial crisis. It extended transparency beyond equities to bonds and derivatives, created new venue categories including the organised trading facility, and pushed trading of shares onto regulated venues.
Conduct obligations are detailed. Firms must categorise clients, assess appropriateness or suitability depending on the service, govern products against a defined target market, evidence best-execution with documented factors, record telephone and electronic communications, and disclose costs on an aggregated ex ante and ex post basis.
The research unbundling rule separated payments for research from execution commissions, reshaping European sell-side economics. Implementation sits with national regulators such as the fca in the UK, bafin in Germany and cysec in Cyprus, coordinated by esma, with mifir carrying the directly applicable parts.
Related: mifir, esma, best-execution, client-categorisation, priips-kid