Lawmakers passed a motion yesterday to review the city's four major financial regulators to decide whether the government should improve them.
The move comes amid a chorus of complaints about regulatory oversight and overlapping in scandals related to sales of Lehman Brothers minibonds and Citic Pacific's foreign currency losses.
Civic Party councillor Ronny Tong Ka-wah, who tabled the motion, said the regulatory regime has not protected retail investors from complex financial products. 'The financial regulators have overlapping areas of responsibility between themselves. In the past 20 years, globally, regulators have tried to reform their regulatory frameworks', and Hong Kong should too, he said.
Mr Tong's motion passed by a show of hands. It calls for the government to consider improvements to the Monetary Authority, the Securities and Futures Commission, the Office of the Commissioner of Insurance and the Mandatory Provident Fund Schemes Authority.
Amendments added calls for the government to consider setting up a one-stop conflict resolution service for the financial sector, and to review whether Hong Kong should have four regulators with overlapping responsibilities and rely only on financial institutions to disclose the risks of complex financial products.
The amendments also frame the reforms as the result of complaints related to Lehman Brothers minibonds and Citic Pacific.
