The regulator has issued a consultation paper proposing enhanced powers to deal with risks that can undermine the financial sector.
Singapore's financial industry regulator is seeking comments on the proposed provisions granted under the New Omnibus Act for the Financial Sector, which will give it more powers to address financial-sector wide risks.
The proposed new act, detailed in a consultation paper published on Tuesday, expands the Monetary Authority of Singapore's (MAS) power to issue prohibition orders (PO), regulate virtual asset service providers for anti-money laundering (AML) and countering of financing of terrorism (CFT) purposes, impose requirements on technology risk management, and provides statutory protection from liability to mediators, adjudicators and employees of an operator of an approved dispute resolution scheme.
Harmonized and Expanded Powers
MAS noted that its current PO powers reside only in the Securities and Futures Act, the Financial Advisers Act and the Insurance Act. As such, it currently cannot issue POs to persons regulated under other Acts administered by MAS, even if they have committed serious misconduct in the financial industry.
«The existing PO powers also do not comprehensively address risks as they only prohibit the subject from carrying out a limited scope of regulated activities,» it said in the consultation paper.
MAS also said that it wants to align its AML/CFT regulation and supervision of virtual asset service providers (VASPs) with the recently revised Financial Action Task Force (FATF) standards. «The anonymity, speed and cross border nature of their activities make this sector highly vulnerable to criminal abuse,» MAS said in the paper.
Single Law
If passed, the act will consolidate similar provisions for various classes of financial institutions in the MAS Act into a single legislation. Interested parties have until August 20 to submit their comments.
