Capital market regulator to procure new surveillance system

Sri Lanka’s capital market regulator, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is currently looking at procuring a state-of-the-art market surveillance system, a top official said.

SEC Chairman Thilak Karunaratne told Mirror Business that three officials from his surveillance division had been to Malaysia’s SEC to check out the surveillance system they were using.

 The current surveillance system of Sri Lanka’s SEC, procured from Millennium IT (MIT), a unit of London Stock Exchange (LSE), is about five years old.

 According to Karunaratne, surveillance technology has advanced greatly within the last few years. A major shortcoming of the existing surveillance system used by the SEC is, mostly it is operated manually, according to SEC Director Surveillance Tushara Jayaratne.“For example, the existing one does not have an automatic alert system; it has to be done manually. But there are new systems in the world which are fully automated,” he said.

 Karunaratne said they had already earmarked two new state-of-the-art surveillance systems, which have the requirements the SEC was 
looking for.

 Another option the SEC has is to carry out an upgrade to the existing surveillance system, as MIT has come up with a system upgrade, he said.MIT, a homegrown company, later acquired by LSE, has been long associated with the capital market of Sri Lanka, providing the required technology.

The surveillance arm of the SEC was revamped in May 2015. During that year SEC streamlined certain surveillance measures and had been proactive in curbing market misconduct.The SEC is also cooperating with other law enforcement bodies such as the FCID, CID and AG’s Department with regard to surveillance and investigation matters.