New regulations are pushing many retail foreign exchange platforms to move away from market making, towards an agency brokerage model, but this may not be good news for clients.

As regulators seek to push more business onto exchanges and into central clearing, and to make derivatives and other markets more transparent and more resilient, the reform of the securities industry is well under way. What will regulations mean for businesses in practice?

New regulations, specifically the push towards central counterparty clearing, are having a huge impact on banks' over-the-counter foreign exchange operations. As the banking sector undergoes significant changes, what will this mean for banks' organisational structures and the foreign exchange market?

As their global operating models evolve, what do investment managers need from their service providers and what can they do to help themselves?

The introduction of mandatory clearing for over-the-counter derivatives will bring with it a widescale, and costly, post-trade infrastructural reorganisation and a host of new considerations for the industry.

Last year, customer volumes overtook interbank volumes in the foreign exchange market for the first time. Electronic and high-frequency trading help to account for the change, as does the rise of retail participants – but regulatory change is also helping to cement this trend.

Two central counterparties are currently being built to clear foreign exchange options. There is a great deal of preparation to be done.

The realisation of the Single Euro Payments Area has been dogged by delay and now, even before SEPA Direct Debit has launched, it looks to some as though the European Commission is moving the goalposts before mandating an end-date. Frances Maguire explores whether the industry can jump this final hurdle.