Short Sales: Consob calls for operators to fully comply with rules
Considering the current international financial context and the impact that short sales may have on the orderly conduct of trading and on market integrity, the Italian Securities and Exchange Commission (Consob) calls for all operators to fully comply with the rules on trading and delivery of financial instruments to the settlement system within the deadlines set forth by current legal and regulatory provisions in force.
Consob is willing to strictly and rigorously exercise its supervisory powers, in order to prevent and counteract any anomalous or improper conducts, particularly regarding the duty to deliver securities within the applicable deadlines. Monitoring will be carried out in close collaboration with the market operators and the operators for the clearing and settlement systems.
The Commission reserves the right to adopt further measures, should the development of the market so require.
Consob emphasises that it has already applied sanctioning measures against operators who have carried out short sales of listed securities in violation of the provisions on market integrity.
This notice falls within the initiatives of the CESR (the Committee of European Securities Regulators) for the coordination of measures on short-selling in EU member states, as part of the effort to combat market abuse.
