News Articles

NZX 2011 Full Year Financial Results Analyst Call

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 06:28:10 GMT

As advised on 17 January 2012, NZX’s preliminary 2011 full year financial results will be released pre market on Monday, 20 February 2012.

NZX will be holding a conference call for analysts at 10.30am on that date.

Those wishing to participate in the call should contact rowan.macrae@nzx.com for dial-in details

Australian Resources Conference 201

Thu, 09 Feb 2012 06:24:13 GMT

Perth will host the Australian Resources Conference and Trade Show (ARC 2012) from 12 to 14 November this year. ARC 2012 is the first event of its kind in Australia to bring together all facets of the resources sector, in one city and at one time, providing a comprehensive overview of the Australian resources industry to domestic and international delegates.

ARC 2012 is a joint initiative of ASX and the Financial Review, with the assistance of the Western Australian Government and Commonwealth Department of Resources and Energy.

The Premier of Western Australia, the Hon Colin Barnett MLA, said: “It is fitting that Western Australia hosts such a landmark event. The state is one of the most productive and diversified mineral and petroleum regions in the world, with approximately 540 commercial mineral projects and 969 operating mines, producing over 50 different minerals.”

ASX Managing Director and CEO, Elmer Funke Kupper, said: “ASX is confident the Australian Resources Conference and Trade Show will become the pre-eminent resources event in the Asia-Pacific region. It will showcase the Australian resources industry to an international audience by providing the latest news, expert information and unrivalled opportunities for connecting with global peers.

“ASX has a long and productive association with the resources industry. Mining and oil and gas companies comprise ASX’s largest industry group, with around 960 companies amounting to 45 per cent of all ASX-listed entities, with a market capitalisation of approximately $450 billion.”

CEO of Fairfax Media, publisher of the Financial Review, Greg Hywood, said: "Being the leading publisher of business journalism in Australia makes this conference an ideal fit for the Financial Review. The importance of mining and energy in the Australian economy is undoubted and will only grow."

ARC 2012 will feature presentations from government and international experts on a wide range of industry issues, including the latest products and services, and economic outlook. There will also be sessions focused on professional development and a dedicated investor exchange to promote Australian-listed resources companies to domestic and international investors.

ARC 2012 is also supported by the Perth Convention Bureau, Perth Convention and Exhibition Centre, and Tourism Western Australia. More information about ARC 2012, including speakers and session topics, is available here: http://www.arc2012.com.au.

CME Group Announces Record Energy Trading Volumes

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 21:17:11 GMT

CME Group, the world's leading and most diverse derivatives marketplace, today announced it set a new record for trading volumes for its energy products on Tuesday, February 7. Trading volume for energy futures and options contracts totaled 3,489,302 contracts yesterday, climbing 13 percent higher than the previous record of 3,098,129 contracts on February 22, 2010. These contracts are listed by and subject to the rules of NYMEX.

"Yesterday's record was the result of strong trading volumes across our energy complex, which includes NYMEX WTI crude oil, Henry Hub Natural Gas, and our power contracts and refined products," said Gary Morsches, Managing Director, Global Energy at CME Group. "We offer the most benchmarks for the energy markets, and will continue to work with our global customers to ensure we have the right products and services that meet their risk management needs."

SIFMA Statement On Proposed FATCA Regulations

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 20:56:25 GMT

SIFMA today released the following statement from Kenneth E. Bentsen, Jr., executive vice president, public policy and advocacy, in reaction to proposed regulations to implement the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA).

“FATCA is the most comprehensive statute ever passed to enhance compliance by Americans with U.S. tax laws through information reporting and withholding, with virtually the entire burden for implementing the new law falling on U.S. and foreign financial services firms. The Internal Revenue Service today issued long-awaited proposed regulations to implement the new law. The proposed regulations are nearly 400 pages long and include substantial modifications to the preliminary IRS guidance on FATCA. We look forward to analyzing the proposed regulations in more detail with a keen eye towards their impact on foreign investment in the United States, commercial viability, compatibility with local laws and the costs and compliance burdens that they will impose on our members in order to assist the IRS in addressing U.S. tax avoidance.

“As an initial matter, we very much appreciate the great lengths to which the Treasury Department has gone in developing proposed regulations in order to transition into these new requirements, and we are grateful to Treasury and IRS officials for seeking industry comments and incorporating many into these proposed regulations. The proposed regulations contemplate providing important additional time for financial services firms to develop systems and processes to implement the new law, begin reporting and withholding relating to U.S. persons with offshore accounts. The proposed regulations also have partially incorporated one industry recommendation that, to the greatest extent possible, FATCA requirements should utilize existing customer systems rather than require our members to develop new, unique and costly systems.

“Nevertheless, implementation of FATCA will impose significant challenges and costs for many United States financial services firms and their customers. The proposed regulations, as a well as a joint statement released today by the United States and certain European countries, indicates a willingness on the part of these parties to work together in this effort to tackle tax evasion, while seeking to address legal impediments relating local country data privacy and security.

“As we have said throughout the comment process, it will take time to fully assess the impact of these new rules on financial markets, on bilateral and multilateral tax cooperation, and on foreign investment in the United States. SIFMA looks forward to participating in the comment process on the proposed regulations, and providing further input to the IRS and Treasury as the implementation of FATCA continues.”

FSB Legal Entity Identifier (LEI) Initiative Industry Advisory Panel - Membership

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 20:43:08 GMT

On 12 January 2012, the FSB called for the nomination of a small number of experts to a private sector panel advising an FSB LEI Expert Group of key stakeholders from the global regulatory community taking forward work on the Legal Entity Identifier initiative.

The Expert Group is pleased to announce the organizations that will be represented on the Industry Advisory Panel:

Organisation

Alfa-Bank

Alfred Sloan Foundation

Association of National Numbering Agencies (ANNA)

Brazilian Financial and Capital Markets Association

CME Group

Corporation for National Research Initiatives

International DOI Foundation (DOI)

Depository Trust and Clearing Corporation (DTCC)

Enterprise Data Management Council (EDM)

European Banking Federation

Federation of Euro-Asian Stock Exchanges

German Investment and Asset Management Association (BVI)

Global Financial Markets Association (GFMA)

GS1

S.D. Indeval S.A. de C.V.

ISITC Europe

Investment Industry Association of Canada

Investment Management Association

International Organization for Standardization (ISO) Technical Committee 68

International Organization for Standardization (ISO) Working Group 6 (LEI)

Japan Securities Dealers Association

Japanese Bankers Association

Korean Financial Investment Association

Mexican Bankers Association

OpenCorporates

Regis-TR

Risk Management Association

J.M. Smucker Company

Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT)

Thomson Reuters

Tokyo Stock Exchange

Trade Repository Sub-group of the OTC Derivatives Working Group of the Treasury Market Association of Hong Kong

XBRL

The Expert Group looks forward to valuable input from the Panel to assist the FSB in fulfilling the G-20 mandate “to prepare recommendations for the appropriate [LEI] governance framework,representing the public interest,” by the G-20 Summit in June 2012.

European Commission Welcomes US Move To Ensure Enhanced International Tax Cooperation In A More Business-Friendly Way

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 20:02:50 GMT

The Commission welcomes the USA's acceptance of an government-to-government approach to tackling tax evaders and implementing the US Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA).

This more business-friendly arrangement for EU financial institutions is the result of intense discussions with the USA, following a letter sent by the Commission and EU Presidency to the US tax authorities in April 2011 (see IP/11/413).

Through a government-to-government approach to tax information exchange, the administrative burden, compliance costs and legal difficulties which EU financial institutions would otherwise face in applying the FATCA provisions should be greatly reduced. The financial industry estimates that the costs of ensuring compliance with FATCA as initially designed would have been significant, with some sources estimating the cost of the required adaptation as $100 million for each multinational bank.

Any Member State that wants to should now be able to adopt this government-to-government approach to information exchange through coordinated bilateral agreements with the USA.

This would benefit Member States' tax administrations by ensuring reciprocal information provision by the US, and could be the basis for broader cooperation between the EU and the US on information exchange at a later stage.

In this context, the Commission will continue work to ensure that EU and national data protection legislation is fully respected in the implementation of the FATCA provisions.

Overall, this cooperation with US regarding FATCA should help greatly in advancing the EU's efforts to promote the global application of automatic exchange of information for tax purposes. It could also contribute to promote a single approach at global level to reporting arrangements on financial institutions.

CFTC Charges Texas Resident Christopher B. Cornett In Foreign Currency Fraud Action

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 17:22:30 GMT

The U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) today announced the filing of an enforcement action against Christopher B. Cornett of Buda, Texas, charging him with solicitation fraud, issuing false account statements, misappropriating pool participants’ funds, and failing to register in connection with an off-exchange foreign currency (forex) fraud.

According to the CFTC complaint, filed on February 2, 2012, in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Texas, from at least June 2008 through at least October 2011, Cornett solicited prospective pool participants to provide funds for a pooled investment in forex. Cornett acted as the manager and operator of the pool, which was referred to at various times as ITLDU, ICM, International Forex Management, LLC and/or IFM, LLC. In soliciting prospective pool participants for the forex pool, Cornett allegedly falsely told prospective pool participants that, while there were weeks when Cornett either lost money or broke even trading forex, Cornett had never experienced a losing month or a losing year trading forex.

During the period from June 18, 2008, through September 2010, Cornett allegedly solicited approximately $7.07 million from pool participants, pool participants redeemed approximately $1.64 million and Cornett lost approximately $4.17 million of the pool’s funds trading forex. During this period, Cornett allegedly had only one profitable month trading forex with pool funds. As a result, Cornett allegedly misappropriated approximately $1.26 million of the pool’s funds. Furthermore, most, if not all, of the profits, losses and account balances that Cornett reported to pool participants were false, according to the complaint.

From October 2010 through October 2011, Cornett allegedly solicited an additional approximately $6.95 million from pool participants, and pool participants redeemed an additional approximately $2.22 million. During this period, Cornett transferred approximately $1.81 million of pool participant funds to accounts at three foreign firms and lost all but approximately $1,600 trading forex, according to the complaint. Cornett also is alleged to have transferred approximately $1.56 million of pool participant funds to three additional foreign firms during this period. Because Cornett was acting as a commodity pool operator (CPO) from October 18, 2010, through at least October 13, 2011, he was required to be registered as a CPO. As of October 13, 2011, Cornett allegedly had failed to register as a CPO.

In the litigation, the CFTC seeks restitution, disgorgement, civil monetary penalties, trading and registration bans and a permanent injunction prohibiting further violations of the federal commodities laws.

The CFTC appreciates the assistance of the U.K. Financial Services Authority, the British Virgin Islands Financial Services Commission, the Ontario Securities Commission, Germany’s BaFin, and the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority.

CFTC Division of Enforcement staff members responsible for this action are Patrick M. Pericak, Daniel Jordan, Jessica Harris, Rick Glaser, and Richard B. Wagner.

NYSE Euronext Signs First Contract To Manage Three China Securities Indices - First Foreign Company To Oversee The Calculation And Administration Of CSI Indices

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 15:57:37 GMT

NYSE Euronext (NYX) today announced that it has agreed with China Securities Index Co., (CSI) to manage the calculation of three of CSI’s indices: Overseas China Internet Index, Overseas China Consumer Discretionary Index and Overseas China Consumer Staples Index. Leveraging NYSE Euronext’s operational and listed products expertise, this new initiative represents a significant milestone for the global index services of NYSE Euronext to further expand its index offerings in the Asian region meeting the growing demand to track the performance in Chinese companies.

CSI, the first Chinese index customer, will use the global index services of NYSE Euronext for the maintenance, calculation and distribution of its index values and data for the Overseas China Internet Index, Overseas China Consumer Discretionary Index and Overseas China Consumer Staples Index. Through these three indices market participants can track a portfolio of stocks covering varying sectors of the Chinese economy using the real-time calculation and dissemination services provided by NYSE Euronext. Furthermore, Exchange Traded Products that track these indices are anticipated to list and trade on NYSE Arca, NYSE Euronext’s all-electronic US trading platform.

“Having CSI, one of China’s leading index providers, select NYSE Euronext’s Global Index Group as their index provider of choice is a testament to the growing momentum of our value in the indexing space,” said, George Patterson, Managing Director, Global Index Group. “This new relationship further underscores NYSE Euronext’s commitment to expand our index services to Asian markets and other key regions around the globe.”

For the methodologies for calculation of the Overseas China Internet Index, Overseas China Consumer Discretionary Index and Overseas China Consumer Staples Index, as well as more information on the indices, please visit the CSI website: http://www.csindex.com.cn/sseportal_en/csiportal/zs/indexreport.do?type=1

CBOE Holdings Declares First Quarter 2012 Dividend

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 15:52:39 GMT

CBOE Holdings, Inc. (NASDAQ: CBOE) announced today that its Board of Directors has declared a quarterly cash dividend of $0.12 per share of common stock payable on March 23, 2012, to stockholders of record at the close of business on March 2, 2012.

ISE Named "Best Exchange Client Service" At Wall Street Letter 2012 Institutional Trading Awards

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 15:49:35 GMT

The International Securities Exchange (ISE) announced today that it received the "Best Exchange Client Service" award at the Wall Street Letter 2012 Institutional Trading Awards. Winners were determined by a panel of independent judges and based on the level of innovation and client satisfaction demonstrated by the nominees.

"ISE is very honored to receive the award for Best Exchange Client Service from Wall Street Letter," said Jeanine Hightower, Business Development Officer. "The customer-facing teams within ISE work every day to meet the needs of our member firms, and we are grateful that our efforts were acknowledged by the judges of this award."

For a complete list of winners at the Wall Street Letter 2012 Institutional Trading Awards, please click here.