A speech by ASIC Commissioner, Belinda Gibson, to the AIRA Annual Conference 2009 on 2 December 2009.
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My topic today (I should say given, not chosen, as it's a mouthful) is "Playing by the rules: a new regulatory environment is changing the way that corporations relate to investors and the finance community".
I propose to start with a brief outline of ASIC's priorities in the current regulatory environment, to set some context for the balance of my address.
Then I will look at the market environment. There are two themes that frame the communication conundrum that you face:
- 21st century technology enables the provision of enormous amounts of data to everyone, quickly and relatively cheaply. But is all that data useful or capable of comprehension?
- The biggest investors in our markets are well resourced, sophisticated and devour information. Where does that leave the retail investor with less knowledge and less time?
After a brief foray into the principles of "clear, concise and effective", I want to raise some ideas that I hope might lead to a discussion about improving the efficacy of prospectuses and annual reports. Finally I will close with a gentle reminder about the importance of securing confidential information.