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The Ministry of National Economy has unveiled draft legislation setting out the framework for corporate bonds and securitization operations. The purpose of the new rules is to modernize existing legislation on bond issuance and provide Greek companies with new sources of funding. While the government itself has made some use of securitization in recent years, existing legal rules are quite unfavourable, as far as corporates are concerned. The draft attempts to correct this situation by providing a new set of regulations on the issuance of bonds backed by assets, including real estate and monetary claims against third parties, by Greek societe anonymes, as well as some necessary tax relief. New rules on issuing bonds are also proposed, at a time when the use of debt as a means of raising capital is being encouraged by the Athens Exchange and the Ministry of National Economy. It will become possible to issue bonds following a decision to do so by a company's board of directors, rather than needing a shareholders' decision as before.

In October 2002 the Finnish government issued a proposal to the Finnish parliament to replace the existing Finnish Act on Financial Supervision by a new Act of the same name. The purpose of the proposed Act is to intensify and make more efficient financial supervision through a number of amendments to the supervisory measures and powers available to the Finnish Financial Supervision Authority (FSA) and to increase the authority of the FSA.

The Securities and Exchange Law of Japan does not generally require any company to report quarterly business results and financial condition. Although certain listed companies voluntarily disclose financial results on a quarterly basis, only companies with their securities listed on certain markets for emerging companies, such as Mothers on the Tokyo Stock Exchange (TSE), are required to file quarterly disclosure statements under the regulations of the relevant stock exchanges.

The Securities (Miscellaneous) (Amendment) Rules 2002, which came into effect on November 15 2002, introduced new exemptions for section 80 of the Securities Ordinance for relieving prohibition of the uncovered short selling of securities.

The Securities and Exchange Commission has brought its first cases against companies allegedly breaking Regulation Fair Disclosure, a rule designed to prevent selective disclosure of corporate information.

On November 7 2002, the China Securities Regulatory Commission and the People's Bank of China jointly issued the Interim Measures on Administration of Domestic Securities Investment of Qualified Foreign Institutional Investors (QFII). These measures allow foreign investors to invest in publicly traded, yuan-denominated A shares, treasury and corporate bonds listed on the Shanghai and Shenzhen stock exchanges. The new rules became effective December 1.

European competition regulators will not go easy on the financial services industry just because they are keen to promote a single financial market, according to competition commissioner Mario Monti.

The cold winds of corporate scandal and tightening securities regulation are blowing north from the US. Ben Maiden reports on how Canada is trying to keep its own identity, at its own pace

Allen & Overy has advised lead manager and arranger Morgan Stanley on the securitization of forest land by Finnish forest products company Stora Enso.

Samsung Life Insurance has created a new template for Asia's increasingly sophisticated securitization market - cross-border residential mortgage-backed deals from Korea.