A new report from the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) published on Friday calls for greater transparency in credit default swap (CDS) markets, saying that this would ultimately benefit market players despite the potential costs.

The report from the group of global regulators says that improving post-trade transparency in CDS markets by making the price and volume of individual transactions publicly available “will increase the efficacy of the G20 commitments to reform the over-the-counter (OTC) derivatives markets.” As a result, it calls on policy-makers to enhance post-trade transparency in their CDS markets.

The report, which was prepared by IOSCO’s task force on over-the-counter derivatives regulation, also sets out considerations for regulators that it suggests would help deliver the anticipated benefits of post-trade transparency and minimize the potential costs.

These considerations include: limiting the delay between a trade and public reporting; whether special rules should apply to large transactions; and measures to ensure the confidentiality of the identities of market participants; among other things.

The IOSCO report also suggests that these measures could be adopted incrementally. For example, it says that regulators could consider “introducing post-trade transparency for more liquid index CDS instruments initially, and expanding a post-trade transparency regime to more illiquid index products and single-name CDS at a later stage.”

Similarly, the IOSCO report says that a jurisdiction could consider allowing delays in either reporting or public dissemination in the initial stages of mandatory post-trade reporting, with the intention of reducing these delays over time.

The report examines the impact of mandatory post-trade transparency in certain CDS markets in the U.S., which finds that transparency did not have a substantial effect on market risk exposure, or market activity. It notes that Canada and the European Union have adopted, or are expected to introduce, legislative and/or regulatory frameworks in the near term that will mandate post-trade transparency. In addition, Japan has a legislative framework that requires public dissemination of certain information regarding OTC derivatives transactions.