On November 12, 2014, the International Swaps and Derivatives Association (“ISDA”) officially released the ISDA 2014 Resolution Stay Protocol (the “Protocol”), a mechanism that contractually imposes a stay on certain default rights in ISDA contracts between adhering parties during the resolution of a significantly important financial institution (SIFI) counterparty or one of its affiliates.
The first section of the Protocol—addressing default rights under Special Resolution Regimes (“SRRs”) (e.g., the U.S.’s OLA and FDIA)—is relatively uncontroversial. It merely ensures that adhering cross-border counterparties will be bound by the preexisting stay provisions of a foreign SRR, even if the jurisdictional limitations of the SRR would normally exempt such cross-border counterparties. This section went into affect for the 18 adhering banks on January 1, 2015.
The second section of the Protocol—addressing default rights under the U.S. Bankruptcy Code—has been met with significantly more contention. This section confines, to a limited extent, the use of currently existing “safe harbors” in the Code, by contractually limiting certain cross-default rights in ISDA contracts in the case of a counterparty’s affiliate’s bankruptcy, so that the affiliate is not also forced into bankruptcy, where close-out rights are safe-harbored. Significantly, this section will not go into effect until further regulations are promulgated by the Federal Reserve and other U.S. regulators. The concept behind the Protocol’s second section is that a failure of one part of a SIFI should not necessarily lead to defaults and close-outs of derivatives and repos sitting in affiliates of the SIFI, if the affiliate is still performing on its obligations.
The HLS Bankruptcy Roundtable has focused on the Code’s safe harbors previously. Click here for an analysis of the effect of the safe harbors on systemic risk; click here for an argument for narrowing the safe harbors for repos.
Congress is also currently considering the issue of the safe harbors in the case of a SIFI failure. Click here and here for previous coverage of currently pending legislation, the Financial Institution Bankruptcy Act, which would impose a short stay on financial contracts in the case of a SIFI resolution under the Bankruptcy Code.
For a full discussion of the Protocol, please see Mayer Brown’s Legal Update, here.
(This post was drafted by Stephanie Massman, J.D. ’15.)