Important information on transparency obligations under Exchange Rules of FSE and General Terms and Conditions of DBAG for Regulated Unofficial Market

01 Apr 2020

Important information on transparency obligations under Exchange Rules of FSE and General Terms and Conditions of DBAG for Regulated Unofficial Market

The spread of COVID-19 poses serious challenges for the economy. The developments on capital markets reflect the great uncertainties of these days. Especially in such times of crisis, the provision of orderly and fair markets is a top priority for us.

The transparency obligations according to the Exchange Rules for the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (“Exchange Rules”) and the General Terms and Conditions of Deutsche Börse AG for the Regulated Unofficial Market on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange (“GTC Open Market”) are of particular importance in this regard. Due to the current situation we therefore would like to provide you with the following information:

Neither the Exchange Rules nor the GTC Open Market reflect possibilities of deadline extensions or other alleviations with regard to the fulfilment of transparency obligations. However, we are aware that due to the current situation, it may not be possible for your company to comply with these obligations. Therefore, we are of course prepared to take full account of any circumstances and difficulties that may arise in dealing with breaches of duty. In order to be able to classify, examine and evaluate your individual situation, we would like to ask you to proceed as follows:

  1. Contact us as early as possible in writing at rule-enforcement@deutsche-boerse.com. Please inform us of the status of your financial reporting and, if applicable, your audit process.
  2. Please carefully document the following information continuously so that you can send it to us in due course:
  • any efforts in terms of compliance with transparency obligations,
  • if applicable, causality between a breach of duty and COVID-19 and
  • any other significant difficulties that your company has encountered in connection with the current situation.

At examining and evaluating a breach of duty on the basis of the documentation received, we will in particular take into account the public statement by the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) on the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic for the publication of financial reports (https://www.esma.europa.eu/press-news/esma-news/esma-issues-guidance-financial-reporting-deadlines-in-light-covid-19). Please note that ESMA currently considers only the following financial reports to be "affected": annual financial reports or half-yearly financial reports that relate to a reporting period ending on or after 31 December 2019 but before 1 April 2020.

Please check our website regularly for further additions or changes.