SECP, CEOs review situation
The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan's (SECP), team led by the Chairman SECP and Commissioner(SM) held a detailed meeting with the CEOs of Pakistan Stock Exchange, National Clearing Company and Central Depository Company on Friday morning, to review and discuss the stock market situation, risk management and business continuity.
The index based market halts were triggered for the third time during this week, said a press release issued here. This cooling-off period gave an opportunity to investors to align their trading strategy and collection of margins by the Clearing Company. The participants of the meeting affirmed that risk management system was functioning efficiently and margins were being collected timely. The Market operations were running smoothly as a whole.
The CEOs further apprised that their business continuity plans and disaster recovery setup was in place based on SECP's earlier instructions.
The Chairman SECP emphasized on conducting drills to ensure remote operations of trading, clearing, settlement and custody services while allowing remote access of market participants to such systems in case on-site operations or physical access was impacted. He also suggested adoption of further preventive measures against spread of coronavirus.
The SECP advised CEOs to remain vigilant, continue to provide uninterrupted access to market participants and ensure effective risk management while maintaining actively engagement with their boards of directors and committees for close coordination. The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) through its investor awareness and protection programme has been interacting with audiences to educate them on risk and scope of capital market, insurance and non-banking financial sectors.
During these interaction sessions SECP would create awareness how to protect the public from financial frauds and scams. During FY 2018-19, the Investor Education Department signed seven MoUs with private and public sector universities and institutions. In accordance with the MoUs, the
SECP conducted 110 interactive awareness seminars in multiple cities, including Islamabad, Lahore, Karachi, Peshawar, Quetta, Swabi, Gujranwala, Faisalabad and Multan, said an annual report issued by the SECP. These events included classroom awareness sessions, mentoring for women entrepreneurs and start-ups, incentivesbased stock trading competitions between groups of university students etc. Awareness sessions were also conducted for far-flung areas such as Skardu, Khuzdar and Gilgit through video conferencing.
In addition, advance level workshops were conducted for professional bodies, business community and budding entrepreneurs including Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), National Incubation Centre (NIC) Islamabad, Women on Board- Rawalpindi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (RCCI), Lahore Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), TiE Islamabad Chapter, Rotary Metropolitan Club, session on "Fintech" in collaboration with Ignite, S&P Global in collaboration with Institute of Financial Markets of Pakistan (IFMP).