In August 2014, the Central Counterparty Austria (CCP.A) achieved authorisation under European Market Infrastructure Regulation (Emir) from the national regulator.

Following the schedule that the record date needs to be implemented before switching to Target2-Securities (T2S), the Austria Corporate Action National Implementation Group (Canig) decided in June 2014 to realise this mandatory step. The appointed date from which only the record date will be applicable for corporate events is November 16 2015.

Austria has introduced a range of initiatives aimed at easing intermarket connectivity and standardisation, says Robert Scott, head of custody and collateral solutions at Commerzbank.

“The impact of not having a derivatives market affects the scale of growth and product innovation. However, in 2014 there were record increases in corporate bond issuance, roughly half of which were issued by domestic companies. There have also been significant increases in equity volumes.”

According to Scott, service providers have been focused on impending changes to the Austrian tax reclaim procedure along with challenges in reporting and the ability to effectively strip out costs along the transaction lifecycle.