It appears, energy regulators have gathered sufficient knowledge, and are keen now to acquire experience in practical aspects of REMIT functioning.
Recent Ofgem communication indicated the regulators' key areas of interest for REMIT compliance checking.
Hence, the general milestones are known (see box), however, many question marks may be raised when it comes to details.
UK Ofgem communication of 11 July 2014:
"We recommend that market participants carefully consider if they have robust systems and processes in place to identify, handle and publically disclose any inside information that they possess. The level of detail may vary depending on the market participant. But market participants may wish to consider their system and processes in the following important areas:
Inside information policies – policies and procedures should be established and reviewed as necessary. These should recognise the responsibility to control access to inside information and reduce risk of accidental or intentional misuse. Market participants should ensure that there is clear responsibility for overseeing inside information policies and procedures.
Training – appropriate training should be in place to allow staff to understand the importance of keeping information confidential and about the correct procedures for the disclosure of inside information.
IT controls – market participants should ensure that there are sufficient security and access rules around inside information stored on IT systems.
Internal controls – reasonable steps should be taken to limit the number of people with access to inside information. Market participants may wish to consider developing "need to know" policies around inside information.
External controls – market participants should also consider the circumstances in which they provide inside information to third parties and ensure those third parties are aware of the REMIT obligations."
For instance, considering companies groupings, should there be the uniform, group-wide REMIT compliance documentation or each company (particularly electricity generator or distributor) needs to have it on its own?
The issue raised may be relevant notably for inside information publication system, but also Chinese walls implementation, trade data reporting etc.
What is rather known today, each market participant in the group needs to register under REMIT individually, nevertheless, disclosing in its submission the entire group structure (REMIT secondary legislation regulating the registration issues is expected in the second half of this year, but its key assumptions were already extensively consulted upon by ACER).
However, other elements of the REMIT implementation system in the companies' groupings may be particularly susceptible to divergent interpretations.
Unfortunately, regularly updated ACER Guidance on REMIT also does not cover these questions in sufficient detail.
And what do you think on that?
Should there be centralised or decentralised REMIT compliance system in companies' groupings?