Ontario Securities Commission publishes proposed amendments on disclosure required for foreign offerings

TORONTO – The Ontario Securities Commission (OSC) announced today that it is publishing for a 90-day comment period proposed rule amendments that will remove certain Canadian-specific disclosure requirements for offerings of foreign securities made in Ontario on a private placement basis to sophisticated investors. Broadly speaking, the primary purpose of the proposed amendments is to eliminate the need to prepare a “wrapper” for an offering document in these circumstances.

The OSC expects that the related proposed rule amendments will facilitate foreign securities offerings being made in Canada on a private placement basis to sophisticated investors.

Today’s announcement is made in conjunction with the publication of a decision on an application made in Ontario and certain other jurisdictions by a group of Canadian and foreign dealers for exemptive relief to address these issues.

To ensure that dealers outside of the applicant group are not put at a disadvantage in the marketplace for foreign offerings, the decision will have a 60-day period of delayed effectiveness in order to allow other parties sufficient time to apply for similar relief.

The comment period on the proposed amendments runs until Wednesday July 24, 2013 and the document is available on the OSC’s website: www.osc.ca.

 

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