On December 21, 2012, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (the “Commission” or “CFTC”) approved an exemptive final order (the “Final Order”) providing time-limited relief from certain cross-border applications of the swaps provisions of Title VII of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act (the “Dodd-Frank Act”) and the Commission’s regulations. The purpose of the exemptive order is to foster an orderly phase-in of the new swaps regulatory regime and to provide market participants greater certainty regarding their obligations with respect to cross-border swap activities.

The Commission had published on July 12 of this year a proposed order (the “Proposed Order”) that outlined temporary conditional relief from certain provisions of the Commodity Exchange Act (“CEA”) as well as its proposed interpretive guidance and policy statement (“Proposed Guidance”) with respect to the cross-border application of the swaps provisions of the CEA added by Title VII of the Dodd-Frank Act. The Final Order finalizes the Proposed Order with certain modifications and clarifications. Along with the Final Order, the Commission also proposed further guidance on certain elements of the Proposed Guidance (the “Further Proposed Guidance”); however, as noted below, the Commission determined not to finalize the Proposed Guidance at this time.

The relief of the Final Order will expire on July 12, 2013.

Please see full alert below for more information.