FINLAND Law and Practice Contributed by: Olli Kiuru, Mia Rintasalo and Essi Hietaoja, Waselius
the MiFID II regime. Furthermore, an organiser of MTFs or OTFs can only be a credit institution, an investment firm, a branch of a licensed third- country company or a stock exchange. However, there are some regulatory differenc - es – eg, between securities and other financial instruments. Financial instruments as a category includes securities and financial instruments that are listed in the ISA. There is also some specific regulation on the issuance of securities, which is mainly contained in the Securities Market Act (SMA, 746/2012). Furthermore, where the assets do not qualify as financial instruments but rather as crypto-assets, MiCAR governs the provision The emergence of crypto-assets has impacted the regulatory regime in Finland, mainly due to EU legislation governing crypto-asset exchang - es. Operating trading platforms for crypto-assets or facilitating the exchange of crypto-assets for funds or other crypto-assets requires authori - sation from the FIN-FSA under MiCAR and the ACASP. Please also refer to 10.5 Regulation of Block- chain Asset Trading Platforms . 6.4 Listing Standards The issuance of securities to the public is regu - lated by the SMA. Listed companies also have to comply with the Limited Liability Companies Act (624/2006). A company applying for listing must be prepared to fulfil its statutory disclosure obligation from the date on which it submits its application to be listed on the stock exchange. The information disclosed by a listed company must be timely, consistent and reliable. Factors related to the disclosure obligation are often of services related to such assets. 6.3 Impact of the Emergence of Cryptocurrency Exchanges
reflected in other listing conditions, such as the fulfilment of qualitative capabilities required for listing, the company’s obligation to apply the International Financial Reporting Standards or the corporate governance of the company. MTFs are more lightly regulated trading ven - ues than regulated markets (stock exchanges). Requirements for issuers of financial instruments admitted to trading on an MTF are lighter in relation to disclosure obligations and operating history than for issuers of financial instruments whose financial instruments are traded on a regulated market. In addition to regulatory obligations, listed com - panies must comply with the rules of the stock exchange or MTF. The rules, guidance and oth - er information of Nasdaq Helsinki Ltd (Helsinki Stock Exchange and First North Growth Market Finland) and for companies planning a listing are available on the website of the stock exchange. Regulations by the FIN-FSA also need to be complied with. The Finnish Foundation for Share Promotion has published a guidebook on listing. 6.5 Order Handling Rules The applicability of order handling rules depends on the type of services a market participant provides. Market participants that are regulated under MiFID II and the ISA and that execute orders are subject to order handling rules. The Act on Trading in Financial Instruments imposes specific order handling requirements for stock exchanges, MTFs and OTFs. In accordance with the ISA, an investment firm that provides execution of orders as an invest - ment service shall execute client orders without undue delay. An investment firm may not let the interests of another client or its own interests influence the execution of a client order. An
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