Cambodia will chair the 2022 Asean Capital Markets Forum (ACMF), according to Sok Dara, deputy director-general of the Securities and Exchange Commission of Cambodia (SECC). This year Vietnam was tapped to chair the forum with Brunei slated for that role in 2021.

“It [will be] the first [time] that Cambodia has acted as chair of the ACMF,” he noted. He pointed out that prior to the 2019 edition of the forum that the ACMF chair rotated between Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand because of the advanced state of their capital markets.

“[This] will help Cambodia to strengthen cooperation in capital market development, information sharing, regulations and standards development and enhance capacity building, cross-border transactions and connectivity among the member countries,” he said.

This years’ forum, held virtually in Hanoi, Vietnam, this week, saw the ACMF endorsing key priorities in its five-year action plan for 2021-2025.  These priorities are designed to bring the ACMF Vision 2025 of being an inter-connected, inclusive and resilient capital market to fruition.

Among those priorities are the pursuit of higher levels of transparency and disclosure; continuing with regulatory harmonisation, intensifying capacity building, amplifying communication and awareness and strengthening cooperation and coordination.

The ACMF will continue to collaborate closely with the Asean Working Committee on Capital Market Development (WC-CMD) to develop and execute a sustainable finance agenda in capital markets in the region. To further foster development of the region’s sustainable finance ecosystem, the ACMF will be conducting a study on the development of a common green, sustainable and transitional taxonomy for Asean.

Last week’s meeting also acknowledged the progress of ACMF working groups on the implementation of the six short- to medium-term focus areas identified in the Roadmap for Asean Sustainable Capital Markets It also accepted the provision of technical assistance from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) to engage the Climate Bonds Initiative (CBI) in supporting ACMF’s implementation of the roadmap.

Under the theme of sustainable finance, the ACMF will explore Asean sustainability-linked bond standards to facilitate bond issuance for sustainability-related goals. This will complement the suite of bond standards that the ACMF has already introduced for green, social and sustainability bonds.

The ACMF will continue to collaborate closely with the WC-CMD to promote its sustainable finance agenda in the region. Together with WC-CMD, the ACMF aims to champion an Asean voice at the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26) in late 2021. The ACMF also expressed appreciation to the ADB for its technical assistance support covering activities from 2019 to 2021. The ACMF is a forum comprised of capital market regulators from the 10 Asean jurisdictions, Brunei Darussalam, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and Vietnam. Established in 2004 under the auspices of the Asean finance ministers, the ACMF initially focused on the harmonisation of rules and regulations before shifting towards more strategic issues related to a greater integration of the region’s capital markets under the AEC Blueprint 2015. The ACMF meets twice a year and is currently chaired by the State Securities Commission of Vietnam.

• Tags: ACMF, Asean