CFTC Commissioner Summer K. Mersinger discusses her first year as a commissioner and all of its challenges.

Welcome to the April issue of WFE Focus.

In this month’s edition, we bring you some of the highlights from our CCP & Derivatives Conference, WFE Clear, which was hosted by the Johannesburg Stock Exchange and its clearinghouse, JSE Clear, at the end of March.

The conference was a remarkable success, with academics, policy makers and industry participants engaging in deep and insightful conversations around a wide range of topics in clearing, ranging from the impact of technological innovation to the role of clearing within the real economy.

I was particularly impressed by the exceptional qualit...

In analysing the events of the last year, we can conclude that CCPs remained stable and were able to continue their critical operations. Also, trading on natural gas derivatives markets generally remained orderly despite the high volatility and the sharp reduction in liquidity.

The establishment of CCPs in emerging markets has been found to improve market liquidity, boost transparency, reduce volatility, manage risk and fundamentally increase trust amongst the many stakeholders by a factor of up to 20%. The concomitant benefit to emerging economies has been an exponential growth in foreign investment. Perhaps the biggest benefit of all is the increasing integration of emerging markets into global financial markets.

David Murphy, Visiting Professor at London School of Economics' Department of Law, considers what is next for financial market infrastructures after the collapse of FTX.

JSE Clear CEO and Director of Post Trade Services for the Johannesburg Stock Exchange Alicia Greenwood and Head of Post Trade Strategy Hemash Kala examine the importance of central counterparty clearing in the growth and development of emerging markets.