Thursday, November 25, 2010

Big Changes Proposed to Ontario Securities Act

You wouldn't know it from the title, but Schedule 18 of the Helping Ontario Families and Managing Responsibly Act, 2010 (Bill 135) contains some far reaching amendments to Ontario securities law. Most notably, it contains a legislative framework for regulating derivatives that is missing from both the Securities Act and the Commodity Futures Act.

In addition to numerous clean-up amendments, Bill 135
  • allows the OSC to designate credit rating agencies for the purposes of Ontario securities law but not to regulate the content of ratings or the agency's methodologies;

  • allows the OSC to designate trade repositories, which are entities that collect and maintain reports of completed trades by other entities;

  • provides a legislative framework for trading derivatives; and

  • extends the insider trading prohibition and related civil liabilities to TSX Venture Exchange listed companies with a "real and substantial connection" to Ontario.
Credit Rating Agencies

In an earlier post, I described the CSA initiative to create a framework for regulation of credit agencies. Bill 135 allows the OSC to require the agencies to have a code of conduct applicable to directors, officers and employees and to have policies and procedures to manage conflicts of interest between the agency and client companies.

Trade Repositories

The OSC would be able to designate trade repositories in what appears to be a similar process to that of recognition of exchanges, quotation and trade reporting systems and SROs.

Derivatives

Before the bill was even tabled, the proposed derivative regulation was a matter of speculation, at least in the Globe and Mail. The actual contents of the bill are not as bold as perhaps what was anticipated.

"Derivative" is defined as an option, swap, futures contract, forward contract or other financial or commodity contract or instrument whose market price, value, delivery obligations, payment obligations or settlement obligations are derived from, referenced to or based on an underlying interest (including a value, price, rate, variable, index, event, probability or thing), excluding
  • a commodity futures contract as defined in subsection 1 (1) of the Commodity Futures Act,
  • a commodity futures option as defined in subsection 1 (1) of the Commodity Futures Act, and
  • a contract or instrument that, by the regulations or Commission order is not a derivative.
The bill makes a number of linguistic changes to the Act to accommodate derivatives, such as changing references to "stock exchanges" to "exchanges" and replacing the term "security" (for the most part, but not in all cases) to "security or derivative." To the extent that a particular instrument fits the current definition of "security," there won't be any practical change. However, there are some contracts that might be exempt from the definition before that could now be caught. For example, it is arguable that forward contracts are not "securities" under the current definition unless they could be characterized as "investment contracts."

One problem with the bill is that the definition of "security" in the act has not been amended, which means that many contracts will be both "securities" and "derivatives." It would be preferable for the definitions to be exclusive, that is "security" does not include a "derivative." The bill in fact, gives the OSC the authority to rule that certain classes of derivatives are securities.

It would have been even better if the derivatives provisions were incorporated into the Commodity Futures Act, making it a comprehensive body of rules governing exchange-traded and over-the-counter derivatives, similar to what Quebec has done.

In terms of substantive changes, there isn't much in the bill. It allows for registration to trade derivatives. While this is unlikely to affect investment dealers (who are currently permitted to trade them), it would allow for a tailored registration regime for derivative-only firms.

Derivatives are exempt from the prospectus requirements if a disclosure document is prepared and accepted by the Commission. While the content of the disclosure document is not specified, this appears to be a codification of the current prospectus exemption for exchange-traded derivatives provided a risk disclosure statement is first given to the client. This also reflects the reality that each trade in a derivative results in the issuance of a new security because the clearing house becomes a counterparty to each side of the trade.

Insider Trading

The prohibition on trading on the basis of undisclosed material information (and the resulting civil liability for violations) has been extended to TSX Venture Exchange listed issuers that have a real and substantial connection to Ontario. Currently, the prohibition only extends to Ontario reporting issuers.

It isn't clear why this provision is needed, given that section 18 of TSX VE Policy 3.1 requires issuers with a "substantial connection" to Ontario to make a bona fide application to the OSC to become a reporting issuer within six months of it becoming aware that it has a significant connection. The concern might be that these issuers are traded on alternative trading systems in Ontario; previously the trading would have been done on the Venture Exchange and the BCSC and ASC would have jurisdiction. The Ontario government might be concerned that the very people who are responsible for having the company apply to be an Ontario reporting issuer might improperly delay the application to trade with knowledge of inside information. Even so, it is difficult to see why the provisions weren't extended to all TSX VE listed companies (as the gap continues to exist for those that do not have a real and substantial connection to Ontario) or, like section 57.2 of the British Columbia Securities Act, extended to all public companies regardless of reporting issuer status.

“Real and substantial connection” is not defined, and it could prove unworkable if the OSC adopts a different definition from that in the TSX VE’s rules.



There are a number of more minor problems with the bill. It continues the Ontario government’s insistence on putting provisions in the legislation that in other provinces are left to commission rules. In this case, some provision of National Instrument 21-101 Marketplace Operation are brought into the Act. In addition, the current power given to the OSC to suspend trading on a stock exchange in the event of a market disruption is unclear as to whether it extends to quotation and trade reporting systems and alternative trading systems. Although the provision will be amended to allow suspension of trading in securities and derivatives, the ambiguity remains.

This is legislation, not a commission rule, so there is no notice and comment period. However, it is hoped that some of the concerns with the act (which in my case go more to form than substance) can be remedied by the Legislature's deliberations.

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