The Canadian Securities Administrators today published for comment proposals intended to "streamline and tailor venture issuer disclosure" to reflect the expectations of investors and to improve the manageability of disclosure requirements for issuers.
The CSA's proposals follow a consultation last year by various provincial regulators on tailoring venture issuer regulation, and would replace the governance, disclosure and certification obligations of venture issuers currently found in NI 51-102 Continuous Disclosure Obligations, NI 52-109 Certification of Disclosure in Issuers' Annual and Interim Filings, NI 52-110 Audit Committees and NI 58-101 Disclosure of Corporate Governance Practices with a new National Instrument 51-103 Ongoing Governance and Disclosure Requirements for Venture Issuers.
Among other things, the CSA's proposals would (i) consolidate business, governance and executive compensation disclosure, audited annual financial statements, associated MD&A and CEO/CFO certifications into one document and make modifications to current governance and continuous disclosure requirements; (ii) modify the disclosure obligations of venture issuers in connection with a long form prospectus; and (iii) modify the documents required to be incorporated by reference in the case of a short form prospectus, qualifying issuer OM and the TSX short form offering document.
The CSA also provided a number of questions for commentators to consider in reviewing the proposal and is accepting submissions until October 27.
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