On 18 December 2020, The Stock Exchange of Hong Kong Limited (HKEx) published the conclusions to its consultation on Paperless Listing & Subscription Regime, Online Display of Documents and Reduction of the Types of Documents on Display (Consultation Conclusions).
HKEx received 146 non-duplicate responses in the Hong Kong market. Having considered each respondent’s views, HKEx will adopt all the proposals outlined in the consultation paper with several minor modifications as set out in the Consultation Conclusions.
Under the amended Listing Rules:
- All listing documents in a New Listing must be published solely in an electronic format and New Listing subscriptions, where applicable, must be made through online electronic channels only (Paperless Listing and Subscription Regime);
- The current requirement for certain documents to be put on physical display will be replaced with a requirement for those documents to be published online (Online Display of Documents); and
- The types of documents that it is mandatory for an issuer to put on display for notifiable transactions and connected transactions will be reduced (Reduction of Documents on Display).
The amended Listing Rules will take effect on the following dates:
- Monday, 5 July 2021 – for the Listing Rule amendments relating to the Paperless Listing and Subscription Regime; and
- Monday, 4 October 2021 – for the Listing Rule amendments relating to the Online Display of Documents and the Reduction of Documents on Display.