FMA keen to smooth listings pathway
The number of companies listing on the New Zealand stock exchange is a ‘‘particularly poor’’ measurement of the country’s economy, the market regulator’s boss says.
But the Financial Markets Authority is keen to talk to people about how more overseas investment could be brought here and how KiwiSaver schemes could be offered more investment opportunities.
‘‘We have to be careful there that we don’t give the impression that we hold all the answers or we hold all the levers that could be pushed or pulled to change that dynamic,’’ FMA chief executive Rob Everett said.
‘‘But we feel it’s part of our mandate as a markets regulator to be willing to get into those discussions and even start them if no one else wants to.’’
The FMA has published its annual corporate plan for the first time, after the Government increased its funding by $9.8 million from July this year.
The annual plan set out the FMA’s seven strategic priorities, one of which was to ensure capital market growth and integrity.
Everett said there was a lot of ‘‘headline focus’’ on the lack of initial public offerings (IPOs).
The FMA had spoken to a lot of stakeholders about what was and was not working, and for example, worked with the NZX on corporate governance issues to clarify the listing pathway and minimise red-tape costs.
The FMA was concerned by suggestions firms had either not listed or gone to Australia because of the regulatory burden here.
‘‘How many listings you do a year is, I think, a particularly poor measure of a capital market or an economy.
‘‘I think globally there’s a real shift in how many companies are going public, at what stage in their cycle they’re going public, about why they would go public, and so I think it needs to be a debate about much more than just the old model of you grew to a certain point and at that point most firms then try to decide whether they should go public.
‘‘I think the debate is much more complex now.’’