A crescendo built in thefinancial services industry late last year, as the effective dateapproached for sweeping new regulations. MiFID II, the European Union's version ofDodd-Frank, has capital markets professionals and their internalcompliance colleagues scrambling to position themselves on theright side of this far-reaching and comprehensive regulation.

Why should a U.S.-based corporate finance officer or riskmanager care about a massive new regulatory framework across theAtlantic? The reason is simple: At the heart of the regulation is amandate for investment firms to adopt “best execution” practices.Investment firms are broadly defined as any legal entity whoseregular occupation or business is the provision of one or moreinvestment services to third parties and/or the performance of oneor more investment activities on a professional basis.

Corporate treasurers who interact with European financialmarkets and securities may be directly impacted by the newregulations. Others may be indirectly affected. In the financialmarkets, fiduciary responsibility is fundamental, so the pursuit ofbest execution is logical. The pursuit of shareholder value in thecorporate world is not dissimilar from fiduciary responsibility.Therefore, it's not a stretch to imagine how the concept of bestexecution might apply to corporate treasurers and risk managers aswell.