Insider dealing and money laundering etc. Amendments to the Market Abuse Regulation Inside Information and Insider Lists
Inside information is information of a precise nature which has not been made public, relating, directly or indirectly, to one or more issuers (an issuer is a legal entity which issues or proposes to issue financial instruments) or to one or more financial instruments, and which, if it were made public, would be likely to have a significant effect on the prices of those financial instruments or the price of related derivative financial instruments. The unlawful disclosure of inside information increases the risk of insider dealing which undermines the integrity of the market and investors’ confidence.
	Insider lists are lists maintained by issuers or persons acting on their behalf or on their account (such as advisers and consultants) Such lists must contain details of all persons who have access to inside information and who are working for the issuer under a contract of employment, or otherwise performing tasks through which they have access to inside information. Insider lists are critical to enable the FCA to investigate the unlawful disclosure of inside information and insider dealing. Insider lists also act as a control for issuers to appropriately manage their flows of inside information.
	MAR currently requires issuers or any person acting on their behalf or on their account to maintain an insider list. The use of "or" has caused confusion as some issuers’ advisers are not sure whether they are required under MAR to draw up their own insider list (i.e. separate to the issuer’s insider list). This creates the risk that some of the parties are not maintaining insider lists, which increases the risk of the unlawful disclosure of inside information and persons’ insider dealing on that information.
	The Act makes an amendment to MAR to remove confusion by clarifying who is required to maintain an insider list, establishing that issuers and any person acting on their behalf or on their account are all required to maintain such a list.