Our progress / Quotes

24.06.2016 00:00 / Elvira Nabiullina

Elvira NabiullinaBanks and non-banks will increasingly share their scope of services Three years ago, the Bank of Russia became the financial market megaregulator, assuming all regulatory and oversight functions for the financial industry. Our task was to come up with balanced approaches to non-banking regulation, especially where statutory gaps exist. In banking regulation we have been continually pursuing the implementation of international standards.

08.09.2015 14:10 / Olga Goncharova

Olga GoncharovaFinnopolis: Financial Technologies to Drive Development On 17 September, the inaugural financial innovation forum named Finnopolis 2015 will open in Kazan. The forum is a first for Tatarstan and in many ways, for the entire financial and banking sector.

27.08.2015 15:08 / Alexey Timofeev

Alexey TimofeevNew Role for SROs: a well-planned revolution The new Financial Market SRO Act, signed by the President, is a revolution in Russian financial market regulation and oversight.

28.11.2014 15:03 / Elvira Nabiullina

Elvira NabiullinaOUR POLICY GOALS MUST BE CLEAR A little over a year ago, the Bank of Russia became megaregulator, spreading its control and oversight functions to other financial market segments besides banking. It’s a mass of work, tens of thousands companies: 572 in insurance, 1790 in collective investment, almost 4.5 thousand in microfinance, some 8 thousand pawn shops et cetera. Compare this with a mere 842 companies in banking services, 790 of which are banks.

29.04.2014 15:56 / Denis Spirin

Denis SpirinThe Ideal Model: Why We Need the New Corporate Code The new Corporate Governance Code, passed by the Government and Russia’s financial market megaregulator, the Bank of Russia, deserves to be the news of the day. Sceptics may object that the Code is merely a recommendation, and the best practice of corporate governance contained therein is detached from reality.

09.04.2014 14:06 / Anatoly Karachinsky

Anatoly KarachinskyIDENTIFYING PERFORMANCE RESERVES OF FINANCIAL MARKETS Russia’s financial market produces a staggering billion-plus paper documents yearly. Every individual has to open a bank account, buy insurance, pay fines, taxes, and housing bills. Most people do it by signing papers and wasting time in queues. Most companies have to keep paper copies of their official reports and electronic transactions.

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New listing rules will boost transparency, strengthen corporate governance

25.02.2014 13:30 / Anna Kuznetsova

Moscow Exchange is currently reforming its listing rules, a process that will strengthen the market for both issuers of stocks and bonds, while providing domestic investors with an opportunity to diversify their investment portfolios.

The reform will expand the top securities list while also improving its quality. The aim is to expand the range of instruments that investors have access to, particularly domestic pension funds that have stringent restrictions on the investments they can hold. In addition, stocks and bonds that meet the required criteria will be eligible for immediate inclusion into any list upon placement.

The listing reforms will simplify the system of securities lists and bring it more in line with international standards. It is also our hope that these reforms will help to attract additional flows from international investors.

The new Listing Rules – to be introduced in the second quarter of this year – will reduce the number of securities lists on Moscow Exchange from six to three. The existing A1 and A2 lists will be combined to form the highest list, or Level 1. Level 2 will include securities from the current B, V, and I lists. All remaining names admitted to trading will be included in Level 3.

We expect the reforms to increase the number of stocks on the highest list by about a quarter.

Under the new rules, the percentage of shares in the free float will be included amongst the criteria to determine the quotation list to which a stock is assigned and issuers will be required to publish three years of IFRS results (at present only one year is compulsory) in order to be added to the highest list. Other corporate governance requirements have also been tightened in line with the new Corporate Governance Code introduced by the Central Bank of Russia. For inclusion on the highest list, at least 20% and no fewer than three Directors must be independent. Boards are required to form audit, remuneration and personnel committees, and the majority of Directors on these committees must be independent.

There will be a two-year transition period for issuers to bring their governance practices and systems in line with the new requirements; we do not expect any issuers to leave the top list after the transition period.

In addition to the requirement for three years of IFRS results, bonds will see further restrictions for inclusion on the Level 1 list. An issuer, its bond or its guarantor will need a credit rating to be included on the highest list, and the requisite rating will be increased two notches. The minimum issue size will be increased to RUB 2 bln.

Under the new Listing Rules, bonds will be eligible for inclusion into any list at the time of primary placement. Current requirements on the minimum volume traded mean that most bonds can only be included on high level lists three months after placement. We expect that after the change is implemented more than half of all primary placements will be included into the Level 1 and Level 2 lists, which will increase demand for new placements from domestic bond investors with strict investment restrictions.

Under the new rules, mutual funds will be required to have a minimum NAV to be listed on Moscow Exchange and exceed certain trading liquidity thresholds to be included in the top two lists. We estimate that around one third of mutual funds currently trading on the exchange do not correspond to the new rules, which means asset management firms will have to make certain changes in order to be able to operate under the new conditions. Also, bonds issued by microfinance firms will not be included on the highest list.

In addition to the new three level list system, Moscow Exchange is discussing the potential of introducing a Premium list for issuers with the highest corporate governance standards, a distinction which is valued highly in emerging markets.

28.11.2014 15:03 / Elvira Nabiullina

OUR POLICY GOALS MUST BE CLEAR A little over a year ago, the Bank of Russia became megaregulator, spreading its control and oversight functions to other financial market segments besides banking. It’s a mass of work, tens of thousands companies: 572 in insurance, 1790 in collective investment, almost 4.5 thousand in microfinance, some 8 thousand pawn shops et cetera. Compare this with a mere 842 companies in banking services, 790 of which are banks.

29.04.2014 15:56 / Denis Spirin

The Ideal Model: Why We Need the New Corporate Code The new Corporate Governance Code, passed by the Government and Russia’s financial market megaregulator, the Bank of Russia, deserves to be the news of the day. Sceptics may object that the Code is merely a recommendation, and the best practice of corporate governance contained therein is detached from reality.

09.04.2014 14:06 / Anatoly Karachinsky

IDENTIFYING PERFORMANCE RESERVES OF FINANCIAL MARKETS Russia’s financial market produces a staggering billion-plus paper documents yearly. Every individual has to open a bank account, buy insurance, pay fines, taxes, and housing bills. Most people do it by signing papers and wasting time in queues. Most companies have to keep paper copies of their official reports and electronic transactions.

25.02.2014 13:30 / Anna Kuznetsova

New listing rules will boost transparency, strengthen corporate governance Moscow Exchange is currently reforming its listing rules, a process that will strengthen the market for both issuers of stocks and bonds, while providing domestic investors with an opportunity to diversify their investment portfolios.

28.01.2014 15:10 / Ksenia Yudaeva

Reserve Currencies and the Role of the Ruble The Bank of Russia policy focus has shifted to inflation targeting, sparking a debate on intervention practice and prompting us to reconsider the prospects of the Ruble as a reserve currency.

14.10.2013 13:35 / Alexei Kuznetsov

Taxes and Russian IFC’s Competitive Edge Taxation should not hinder financial market development. This is the motto of MIFC Taskforce’s Tax Project Group that drafts tax reform proposals.

02.10.2013 12:00 / Sergei Shvetsov

The Regulator Needs to Hear the Market A month has passed since the financial markets megaregulator was established. We have solved the key task for the transitional period of FFMS-Bank of Russia merger — maintaining continuity of service, essential for the functioning of the market. We have now initiated systematic analysis of current affairs — from the regulation, control and oversight perspective — in each financial market segment.

11.09.2013 13:45 / Alexander Voloshin

Reforms that benefit the market More than three years have elapsed since Moscow International Financial Center Taskforce was established. We have managed to achieve various degrees of progress in all key performance areas of Moscow’s development as an international financial center.

11.09.2013 12:15 / Igor Jurgens

Self-regulation is balancing rights and responsibility The adopted financial market self-regulation law and the implementation of related practices is an evolutionary step for production forces, to borrow a scientific term. From a common perspective, self-regulation is an absolute must, with the increasing importance of roles played by civil society and the business community. The pendulum has swung from unchecked democracy of the early 90’s to equal partnership of the 00’s to state supremacy. The pendulum must be kept on track: the state is unfit to handle all regulatory functions without considering the interests and healthy intentions of the business community.

11.09.2013 11:59 / Oleg Vyugin

On megaregulator priorities The key starting objective for the new regulator is to reconsider the paradigm of financial regulation based on the prospective advantages of the ongoing megaregulator project. We must aim to minimize the negative impact of structural overhaul of the regulation system.

11.09.2013 11:45 / Alexey Timofeev

The market anticipates Central Bank’s attention to business specifics The establishment of a Central Bank-based megaregulator is a pivotal change in the entire financial market regulation and oversight system. The reform is one of the key phases of system development. An outstanding contribution to the financial market has been made by the Central Bank predecessors – FFMS, FCSM, Minfin, the Russian Insurance Supervision Service and the Labor Ministry, and it would be inappropriate to call the new reform a clean-up of their failed attempts. Using failures as a pretext to delegate financial market regulation functions means going back to square one, a way to justify any regulatory measures that would appear an improvement by mere contrast. This is misleading, since the financial market that has taken shape in Russia is far from its nascent stage.