KUALA LUMPUR (March 8): Prime Minister Datuk Seri Anwar Ibrahim announced that the Securities Commission Malaysia (SC) together with Bursa Malaysia will introduce the LEAP Market Transfer Framework for companies to migrate from the LEAP Market to the ACE Market.
At the same time, Bursa will introduce a new Recognised Approved Adviser Framework that will expand the pool of advisers for the ACE Market, said Anwar in his keynote address at Invest Malaysia 2023 titled “Reshaping Malaysia’s Narrative: Strengthening Resilience & Sustaining Growth”.
There have been grouses among shareholders of LEAP Market-listed firms facing hurdles to migrate to the ACE Market. Based on the current framework, LEAP Market-listed companies are required to be delisted before they could migrate to the ACE Market. They will have to go through a similar initial public offering (IPO) assessment process that non-listed companies do in order to be listed on the ACE Market.
By February, there were six companies that had withdrawn their listings on the LEAP Market, plus one, Topvision Eye Specialist, which is in the midst of undertaking a voluntary delisting, to pave the way for seeking listing status on the ACE Market.
The six companies were Amlex Holdings Bhd and Aurora Italia International Bhd in 2022, TT Vision Holdings Bhd and Cosmos Technology International Bhd in 2021, and JM Education Group Bhd and Polymer Link Holdings Bhd in 2020.
Cosmos and TT Vision are now listed on the ACE Market.
Commenting on the carbon footprint, Anwar pointed out that Malaysia is taking a leadership role in the low-carbon journey by bringing a platform to help companies measure, monitor, and drive reduction in carbon emissions.
“In this regard, I am pleased to announce that next month, Bursa, working with the London Stock Exchange Group, will be rolling out a Centralised Sustainability Reporting platform,” said Anwar.
This will enable companies, both public listed companies as well as non-listed small and medium enterprises, to calculate their carbon emissions impact, he said.
“It will also help them to disclose standardised common ESG (environmental, social, and governance) data in a way that conforms to established global standards,” he added.