ASIC Expects Trading Participants to Provide Services Even During Outages

The regulator is requesting that market participants develop robust solutions for outages.

It is worried about forthcoming technological enhancements that may affect operations.

Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) released a recommendation urging market participants and operators to continue implementing resilient measures to address equities market disruptions.

The regulator even wants market participants to provide trading services on alternate marketplaces in the event of unanticipated situations. The idea is to provide trading services even when there is a power outage.

“While progress has been fair considering the industry's balancing other important market system upgrades and turbulent trading circumstances,” stated ASIC Commissioner Danielle Press.

Furthermore, the financial market regulator issued a consultation document earlier this year to explain how market players may react in the event of an outage.

After the Australian Securities Exchange (ASX) went down in November 2020 due to a significant technological update, the Australian watchdog is eager to address market failures. After an independent examination, it was determined that the ASX Trade system was “not ready to go live.” It resulted in the stock market imposing new licensing criteria.

The most recent market outage worries stemmed from many impending significant upgrades, including the replacement of CHESS, a Cboe technology update, and the introduction of new market integrity regulations. For years, ASIC has been postponing the implementation of its blockchain-based CHESS successor, whilst Cboe aims to install its new technology in February 2023.

ASIC is now requesting that market layers execute all of these modifications within a “reasonable period.”

“We believe that from early to mid-2023, all market participants will have made arrangements for at least new orders to trade on an alternate market during an outage, and that market operators will facilitate this result,” Press stated.

Meanwhile, ASIC prioritizes the security of all regulated market participants. Even though the Australia Financial Services (AFS) incense has no particular criteria for cybersecurity safeguards, the regulator expects 'licensees to handle cyber risk.'

More brokers regulated by ASIC can be found here: (https://www.wikifx.com/en/regulator/0362262880.html).

Smartphones may also connect to the ASIC broker. To download, go to the App Store or Google Play Store and search for “WikiFX.”