On January 8th, the Financial Market Commission (“CMF” for its initials in Spanish) published General Standard No. 501, the “Standard,” which provides instructions to public and regulated corporations.
The Standard includes instructions regarding 2 scenarios regulated by our legislation: (i) habitual policies (hereinafter, the “Policy”); and, (ii) reports on operations with related parties (hereinafter, the “Reports”).
(i) Regarding the Policy, it establishes that the ordinary operations contemplated therein -with prior authorization from the Board of Directors- may be carried out without the requirements and procedures established in article 147 of law 18,046, to the extent that such Policies include not only the date of approval by the Board of Directors but also the justification of the need to have the Policy; the characteristics and conditions that must be met for the execution of such operations (with specific regulations of maximum amounts, the classification of “ordinary” of the operation, exclusions, its recurring nature, not having a relevant impact on the financial situation of the company and other restrictions); control mechanisms; the compliance officer; and disclosure mechanisms.
Its validity is from September 1st 2024 and will also imply the implementation of a compliance model that guarantees that the operation contributes to the social interest, adjusting to the market conditions of equivalent operations.
(ii) Regarding the Report, it establishes for public and regulated corporations the duty to prepare and disseminate a semiannual report of the operations with related parties that have actually been carried out during the respective semester, regardless of whether or not they have been carried out under the protection of about politic.
Said report must contain a series of matters, such as the types and subtypes of operations, counterparties, total amounts involved, currency of the transaction and the number of operations carried out. Likewise, the Standard provides for the case of operations of amounts less than the equivalent of 1,000 UF, which may be reported in an aggregate manner.
About the disclosure of said Report, it is established that it must be found in easily accessible formats on the company’s website and kept available for consultation by any shareholder at its corporate offices within the month following the six-month period in which it reports, which under no circumstances will exempt the company from disseminating as an essential fact all operations whose knowledge is relevant to the investment decisions of investors or the general public.
It is hoped that these measures will continue to promote transparency and corporate responsibility, and strengthen confidence in the financial market, for a more transparent and regulated business environment.
You can read the information brochure published by the CMF here.
