“Ukrainian Exchange” suspends trading due to licence cancellation
9 July 2024 12:57
“The Ukrainian Exchange ceased operations on 8 July due to the cancellation of its licences. This is reported by "Komersant Ukrainian" with reference to the press service of the exchange.
On 5 June, the National Securities and Stock Market Commission (NSSMC) imposed a sanction on the Ukrainian Exchange in the form of licence revocation. The reason for this was the presence of a sanctioned person among the beneficiaries.
“In fact, the only person who has a significant stake in its capital is Timur Turlov, against whom the decision of the National Security and Defence Council to impose five-year sanctions was put into effect by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s decree in October 2022. Among the restrictions on him is the blocking of assets,”
– ekonomichna Pravda reports.
Turlov, through the Freedom Holding Corp. company, owns 24.26% of the shares of the Ukrainian Exchange.
It is noted that the Ukrainian Exchange has filed a lawsuit with the Kyiv District Court to declare unlawful and cancel the NSSMC’s resolution to revoke the licences.
At the same time, according to the National Commission, after considering the application of the Ukrainian Exchange, the court ruled to refuse to take interim measures.
What we know about the Ukrainian Exchange
“The Ukrainian Exchange was founded on 15 May 2008 by leading participants of the Ukrainian securities market jointly with the Russian RTS stock exchange, which later merged with the Moscow Exchange.
“The Ukrainian Exchange was the first to launch an order book, online trading, repo market, central counterparty settlement and a derivatives market. However, in mid-July 2018, the exchange suspended trading in all securities in the direct order mode due to a ban on using Moscow Exchange software in its operations.
In March 2019, the Ukrainian Exchange announced the resumption of trading in the order book on the new platform.
In early February 2024, the Ukrainian Exchange’s shareholders’ meeting decided to increase its authorised capital by 20% to UAH 60 million. At the time of the meeting, its largest shareholders were Freedom Holding Corp. (USA) – 24.2651%, former Minister of Finance of Ukraine and member of the Exchange Board Yuriy Kolobov – 8.9989%, Cyprus-based Dragon Capital Investments Limited – 7.4031%, Chairman of the Board of the Exchange Artemiy Yershov – 6.9032%, and Development Director of the Exchange Oleksiy Sukhorukov – 5.9193%.
In 2023, 159.8 thousand deals worth UAH 20.98 billion were concluded on the exchange, compared to 204.0 thousand deals worth UAH 16.01 billion a year earlier.
