The devil is in the details may be an old saying, but for the government it holds special relevance as it continues with the lengthy task of reforming company listing rules.
For the past decade-and-a-half, the Hong Kong government has sought to introduce a law requiring listed companies to disclose price-sensitive information. Tough penalties would apply for the failure to do so.
Companies are regularly criticised in Hong Kong for not giving enough information to the market in a timely manner. The lack of penalties for not doing so may be the reason why. The stock exchange can currently only mete out a public reprimand under the listing rules.
The planned law, first considered by the government in the mid-1990s, was supposed to be as simple as adding a line in the statute book. But government officials soon found it was a bit more complex than that.
'Initially, we thought this was a simple, easy and quick change,' one government official recalled. 'We thought we could simply add one line' in the proposed Securities and Futures Ordinance.
But then the legal eagles pointed out a problem: the listing rules contain many other requirements for publicly-traded companies which, if they all became law, would burden them with too many legally enforceable obligations. Because of this problem, the Securities and Futures Ordinance implemented in 2003 did not include the section on price-sensitive information.
The government had another go a year later. But a consultation paper issued in 2004 did not make much progress owing to strong opposition from listed companies. Executives complained it would be too easy for them to commit the offence, leading to heavy fines and a jail term. They also were concerned that the Securities and Futures Commission would become too powerful.