* Price reporting agencies adhering to IOSCO principles
* No more annual reviews needed - IOSCO
* But monitoring of price agencies to continue
By Lisa Barrington
LONDON, Sept 17 (Reuters) - The oil market's price-setting
agencies will not need to have their compliance with
industry-agreed reporting standards reviewed for the foreseeable
future, international regulators said on Thursday.
The International Organization of Securities Commissions
(IOSCO) decided that price reporting agencies (PRAs) were
adhering to industry guidelines published in 2012.
"IOSCO, IEA, IEF and OPEC do not believe that further annual
implementation reviews will be necessary at this time," the
regulator said, referring to the International Energy Agency,
the International Energy Forum, and the Organization of the
Petroleum Exporting Countries.
However, the activities of PRAs will continue to be
monitored, IOSCO said.
IOSCO's Principles for Oil Price Reporting Agencies were
written after a request in 2011 from the Group of 20 (G20) top
economies, under pressure to curb speculation blamed for huge
swings in the oil market, to look at the role of PRAs.
The principles cover a number of areas including internal
quality control, conflict of interest and complaints processes.
In last year's review, IOSCO said it had no plan to further
align guidelines for oil PRAs with those for financial market
benchmarks.
The leading oil pricing agencies are Platts, a unit of
McGraw-Hill (NYSE:MHFI) MHFI.N ; ICIS, part of RELX REL.L , formerly
called Reed Elsevier ; privately held Argus Media and privately
held OPIS Oil Price Information Service. They produce price
assessments based on deals, bids and offers in opaque physical
markets.
Thomson Reuters TRI.TO , the parent of Reuters news,
competes with Platts, Argus, ICIS and OPIS in providing news and
information to the oil markets.
(Editing by Dale Hudson)