The Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC) has begun its daily aggregated short positions reports, which are aimed at improving short selling transparency in the Australian market.
The disclosure requirements began on 1 June, and ASIC was due to release aggregated reports from today. ASIC stated that more than 570 different short sellers have lodged over 65,000 short position reports since the beginning of the month.
The reporting regime is part of new legislative requirements under the Corporations Amendment (Short Selling) Act 2008 and the Short Selling Regulations, which followed a nine-month ban of short selling during the global financial crisis. The ban on naked short selling continues.
Short sellers are now required to disclose to ASIC the size of their overall short positions in specified listed financial products. ASIC stated that this information would show investors the risk involved in trading the stock. The aim of the reporting regime is to provide an indication of the bearish sentiment towards a particular stock at any point in time, while showing the amount of overhang in the stock that will need to be covered at some point by short sellers purchasing shares.
The aggregated reports are published on ASIC’s website at www.asic.gov.au/shortselling.
