ICGN Letter to the EU Commission Listing Act: Making Public Capital Markets More Attractive for EU Companies and Facilitating Access to

17 February 2022

ICGN appreciates the need to ensure that companies, in particular small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), will have unimpeded access to the most suitable form of financing and the access to public markets.

 Greater access by SMEs should assist investors, in turn, with their opportunity to invest in these companies and develop access to robust capital markets. That said, ICCN believes that providing SMEs with opportunities to make listing on EU public markets more attractive for companies should not come at the expense of investors, and we have concerns that some of the elements being considered by the EC in this initiative may have the effect of watering down important shareholder rights and protections. A notable example is the Consultation’s set of questions surrounding Special Purpose Acquisition Companies (SPACs). While SPACs may be part of the investment strategy for certain investors, we have concerns about a lack of disclosure and oversight that many investors may not understand.

ICGN


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