VP Meriton meets IOSCO official at State House |19 April 2018

Vice-President Vincent Meriton yesterday received a brief courtesy call from the head of enforcement and senior advisor, special projects of the International Organisation of Securities Commission (IOSCO), Isabel Pastor.

Ms Pastor is currently in the country as a guest speaker at the bi-annual meeting of the Committee of Insurance, Securities and Non-banking Financial Authorities (CISNA). This meeting is being hosted by the Seychelles Financial Services Authority (FSA) from April 16-19.

It brings together various non-banking financial regulators from the Southern African Development Community (SADC) region for the purpose of promoting strong resilient markets, regulatory cooperation, harmonisation of legislative and regulatory framework as well as financial inclusion in the bloc.

“IOSCO is an important international organisation because it’s the global forum for cooperation for the security regulators around the world,” Ms Pastor explained.

With its headquarters based in Madrid, Spain, IOSCO develops, implements and promotes adherence to internationally recognised standards for securities regulation thereby setting the global standards for the security sector.

The organisation has around 140 members who collectively regulate 95% of the world securities markets with the FSA being one of the recent regulators to have joined in March 2018.

“This is a great step forward for FSA, and IOSCO is extremely happy with this step in the right direction because the world economy functions in such a way that one cannot regulate in isolation anymore,” Ms Pator stated.

“We all need to be aware of the global agenda, what is happening internationally, what have been the effects of the financial crisis and how the financial regulators can solve these issues.”

She stated that the securities market continually faces a number of challenges since technologies such as cyber crimes and fintechs (computer programs and other technology used to support or enable banking and financial services) are always evolving.

Ms Pastor added that the organisation is encouraging FSA in becoming a signatory of the IOSCO Multilateral Memorandum of Understanding Concerning Consultation and Cooperation and the Exchange of Information (MMoU) which works as a common understanding among its signatories about how they will consult, cooperate, and exchange information for capital market enforcement purposes.

“We are encouraging them to do so as they will get our help and the help of fellow regulators around the world. We are hoping that FSA will be very active in IOSCO and participate actively in the meetings.”

While in the country Ms Pastor also hopes to sway countries who are not IOSCO members and who are currently attending the CISNA meeting to also become members of the international body.