Regional financial market regulators have agreed to engage all stakeholders within the East African Community (EAC) capital markets to strategize on ways to address the challenge of trading in cross listed securities.East African Capital Markets regulators under their regional forum East African Securities Regulatory Authorities (EASRA) also reiterated their focus on the development of EAC Council directives to support the road map to legal framework convergence and harmonization in the region. "Due to the lack of a common trading, clearing, settlement and depository infrastructure, there has been minimal trading in cross listed securities,” said Japheth Katto, Chairman, EASRA and CEO of Capital Markets Authority Uganda said in a statement issued in Nairobi on Thursday.The statement comes as Kenya’s financial regulator grapples with a myriad of challenges related to non-compliance to the corporate governance guidelines of public listed companies in Kenya by certain listed corporate institutions.Certain actions taken by some directors of these listed companies including forestalling seamless regulation by the CMA- Kenya through numerous court actions are just but a few of the challenges. Despite the same, CMA-Kenya says there seems to be a paradigm shift by capital market players and regulated entities (albeit through stringent actions taken by the regulator against such regulated entities) in acknowledging the importance of complying with these guidelines as an essential part of their disclosure obligations including disclosing the extent of non-compliance in their corporate annual reports.”We need to address this matter urgently if investors have to benefit from a regional market,” Katto said as corporate governance takes center stage globally.The regulators who ended their regional meeting early this week agreed to continue implementing the common standards on corporate governance for market intermediaries as well as work on the development of common standards on corporate governance for listed companies. In recognition of increased regional activity by capital markets participants in the East Africa Community (EAC), EASRA members agreed to amend their Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) to allow for the creation of Supervisory Colleges that will administer joint inspection programs and investigations within regional operators and coordinate surveillance for cross listed companies where need arises.The meeting attended by representatives of the Financial Sector Development and Regionalization Project-1 (FSDRP-1) and Efficient Securities Markets Institutional Development (ESMID), underlined EASRA’s commitment to advancing the regionalization and development of EAC capital markets by partnering with other like- minded organizations.

The meeting further considered and agreed on a harmonized capital adequacy framework for capital market participants who will be operating in the regional market. Each regulator was encouraged to seek stakeholder views in their jurisdictions on the agreed harmonized framework before a final position is taken by EASRA.

”As one of the growing EAC markets, members further agreed to support Burundi in its efforts to develop capital markets by providing technical assistance in terms of facilitating seminars, workshops, trainings and hosting study tours and attachments of Burundian officials,” the statement said.