The Securities and Exchange Commission has unveiled draft guidelines for cross-border issuance of fixed incomes and a mutual recognition agreement by the West African Securities Regulatory Authorities (WASRA) for the West Africa region.
SEC’s Acting Director-General, Mary Uduk, stated that the guidelines were drafted at the 44th conference of the International Organisation of Securities Commissions which held recently in Australia.
According to her, the conference deliberated issues regarding cross-border issuance of securities with the purpose of giving a final approval at its next executive council meeting.
The Aim: Ms Uduk further disclosed that WASRA’s decision is aimed at ensuring that cross-border listing is executed with little or no hitches.
“Recall that WASRA had also consented to the convergence of existing rules of capital market regulatory agencies within the region in a bid to ensure that cross-border listing is carried out with little or no hitches.
“This is expected to allow foreign companies to carry out their businesses and assist in deepening capital markets within the West African sub-region.”-Uduk
She applauded the resolve of WASRA members to build a robust and competitive market in the league of markets by improving on areas such as transparency, disclosure, efficiency, accountability, and investor protection.
She further stated that the Africa and Middle East Regional Committee met and deliberated on the findings of a report which found listings as one of the major challenges in the regions.
The objective of the meeting is to aid the growth of the region’s capital markets through the integration and deepening of such markets by information and experience sharing from different jurisdictions.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), is Nigeria’s apex regulatory institution whose function it is to supervise the Nigerian capital market. The agency is, in turn, supervised by the Federal Ministry of Finance.
