KUALA LUMPUR (March 24): The Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) will waive the annual licensing fees for 2020 on the core regulated activity of all Capital Markets Services Licence (CMSL) entities with pre-tax profit of RM5 million or less during financial year 2019.
The regulator said those that have made the payment prior to today's announcement will be offered a credit to offset next year’s licensing fees.
In a statement today, the SC said it is introducing more relief measures aimed to ease the cost burden of capital market participants. These additional measures will benefit 231 licensed entities, 30 registered audit firms and 9,663 licensed individuals in the country.
“The unprecedented scale of challenges we are facing today demands measured responses that offer relief in the short term and support for longer-term recovery,” said the commission's chairman Datuk Syed Zaid Albar.
“The SC is constantly monitoring the situation and weighing all available options. We would like to assure all market participants that the capital markets will continue to function to support the Malaysian economy,” he added.
Other new measures include:
- Waiver of the annual licensing fees for year 2020 for all individual CMSL holders and Capital Markets Services Representative’s Licence (CMSRL) holders. A qualifying CMSRL holder who has already made the payment prior to this announcement will be offered a credit to offset next year’s licensing fees;
- Reduction of the minimum Continuing Professional Education (CPE) requirements to 10 CPE points from the current 20 CPE points from July 1 for 12 months for all CMSRL holders and Employees of Registered Persons (ERPs);
- Reduction of the minimum training requirements to three days from the current five days from July 1 for 12 months for trading representatives and Marketing Representatives; and
- One-off training subsidy for existing registered firms of the Audit Oversight Board with less than 10 audit partners, up to RM30,000 per firm for Approved Training Programmes conducted by the Malaysian Institute of Certified Public Accountants.
Earlier, the government had, through the Economic Stimulus Package 2020, announced that both the SC and Bursa Malaysia have agreed to waive all listing related fees for 12 months for companies with a market capitalisation of less than RM500 million seeking listing on the Main Market, as well as those seeking to list on the LEAP and ACE markets.
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