26 March 2012

BaFin: Notification procedure for net short positions - Additional advice

On 26 March 2012, section 30i of the German Securities Trading Act and the Regulation on Net Short Positions entered into force. The provisions introduce expanded notification and publication requirements for net short positions, and among other things define the electronic reporting channel.

Section 30i of the Wertpapierhandelsgesetz (WpHG) replaces the General Decree on transparency requirements of BaFin for the shares of 10 selected companies of 4 March 2010. As of 26 March 2012, the notification and publication requirements for net short positions will pertain to all shares admitted to trading on the regulated market of a German stock exchange.

The Regulation on Net Short Positions introduces details on calculating net short positions as well as an electronic notification and publication procedure. For the notifications, BaFin will make available an electronic notification procedure through its Reporting and Publishing Portal. No later than when the first notification is submitted, a successful registration on the Reporting and Publishing Portal of BaFin and a registration for the specialised procedure for net short positions are necessary to be able to notify BaFin of net short positions electronically.

Notifications may be submitted by the person or entity subject to the notification requirements either itself, through its contact person or through an external third party. For notifications to be clearly attributed to the person or entity subject to the notification requirement, each person or entity subject to the notification requirement as well as their contact persons or external third parties must identify themselves to BaFin once, at the latest when the first notification is submitted. For this purpose, the application for the specialised procedure is to be printed out after being transmitted electronically, signed and then sent without undue delay to BaFin by fax or post with further documents required for identification. Once the written documentation has been received, BaFin compares the data provided electronically with the documentation submitted. In the event of successful verification, BaFin activates the notifying party’s account for the specialised procedure. From that point in time, the notifications are no longer deemed to be preliminary. BaFin informs both the reporting party and the person or entity subject to the notification requirement of such account activation.

For the notifying party’s account to be activated by BaFin as soon as possible (so that the notifications are no longer deemed preliminary), users can now register in advance without submitting a notification. Since a great number of persons or entities subject to the notification requirement and users can be expected, BaFin recommends using the opportunity of advance registration.

Press release

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