For the Bucharest Stock Exchange and the capital market, the Great Barriers Shift working group is one of the most important projects. Many of the perennial problems were tackled by the reform, and a few of them have been resolved. A good example might be the removal of the mandatory fiscal agents or some new regulations concerning the documentary and disclosure obligations imposed on investors. It also caused a systematic approach to the challenge of the modernisation of Romanian capital market. But we also saw a lot of verbal, and not real, support, for this modernisation.
For me, this explains why such an endeavour was never undertaken in the past. This time, it is undertaken, it registered some achievements and, since then, has its leaders: Coalitia, BVB and a couple of prominent market participants. It allows us to be optimistic as regards 2015.
To have a progress when it comes to the reform of the market in Romania was, in my opinion, the first measure taken in order to promote the local market to international and institutional investors. We had plenty of items within this positive story, based on what has been completed by the BVB or by the BVB in cooperation with the ASF, especially since the new leadership at the ASF emerged in late spring this year.
A part of this story referred to the changes arising from the 8 Barriers programme, which are mainly dependent on the primary legislation (with limitations I noted above). The means used are non-deal road shows, conferences with institutional investors, our IR service which goes far further than a standard IR of a listed company, our partnership with the leading names from the brokerage industry, the regular BVB London Investors Focus, and many others.
In the same time, we are building a new perception of the BVB and capital market in the eyes and minds of entrepreneurs. It is based on real steps we undertake in order to attract companies to the public market. Since we revealed the idea and concept of AeRO, we observe a significant and growing interest of companies - candidates for listing. The primary function of the capital markets is to provide the companies with funding coming from investors and to give the investors a mitigation of the risks and prospects for a good return on investments. That is why we need to develop the fundamentals of trust and confidence, coupled with the attractiveness of investments - for all groups of investors.
Last, but not least, in order to boost the market liquidity, we have already taken a number of measures. New market indexes, new segmentation of markets, new technologies and practices between trading and posttrading environment, incentives for market-making, lowering of the fees, educational projects, such as InvestQuest - these are only some examples of the measures, which have already been implemented. AeRO market, new system of corporate governance, removal of odd lot market, new market for corporate bonds - those changes are in the pipeline. We may add to this list all initiatives directly targeting the improvement of the visibility of the Romanian market.
