The Autorité des marchés financiers (“AMF”) recently published its 2024-2025 Annual Statement of Priorities, which outlines key initiatives that the Québec securities regulatory authority intends to pursue for the period from April 1, 2024 to March 31, 2025. The initiatives form part of the implementation of the AMF’s 2021-2025 Strategic Plan (the “Strategic Plan”), which envisions the AMF as “a value-added regulator for consumers and the financial sector.”

Key Initiatives

Orientation 1: A proactive regulator that is relevant to consumers in an ever-changing environment

In connection with the first orientation of its Strategic Plan, the AMF must advance its ability to respond rapidly to emerging practices. Over the next year, the AMF intends to:

• enhance its service offerings to improve the experience of its clienteles;
• further financial education through information campaigns and educational sessions and programs;
• improve oversight and supervision of crypto asset trading platforms and insurance products, act to mitigate the risk and impact of auto theft and assess trends in Québec’s private residential mortgage market, identifying related risks for consumers; and
• refine its approaches to monitoring the market and detecting evidence of crypto asset, market abuse and other schemes.

Orientation 2: An influential regulator supporting Québec’s financial sector

To support the second orientation of its Strategic Plan, the AMF must adapt and revise its practices and approaches, in tandem with other national and international regulators. Specifically, the AMF intends to:

• reduce the compliance burden of the clienteles it regulates by:
  1. reviewing the career entry rules for clients subject to, and clarifying the roles and responsibilities of responsible officers under, the Act respecting the distribution of financial products and services (the “Distribution Act”);
  2. implementing a simplified maintenance of registration form for firms, independent representatives and independent partnerships;
  3. working with the Canadian Insurance Services Regulatory Organizations (“CISRO”) to update its general insurance licensing qualification program;
  4. optimizing the management of exam-taking services; and
  5. enhancing its inspection approach to registrants governed by the Distribution Act.
• work with the Canadian Securities Administrators (“CSA”) to simplify or relax the regulatory framework in connection with various projects pertaining to:
  1. the creation of an access model for financial statements and MD&As of non-investment fund reporting issuers to modernize how these documents are made available to investors;
  2. the creation of a delivery model for prospectuses and certain continuous disclosure documents of investment funds to modernize how these documents are delivered to investors;
  3. amendments to annual and interim filing requirements for non-investment fund reporting issuers to increase the quality and usability of disclosure provided to investors;
  4. amendments to the shelf distribution rules to facilitate well-known seasoned issuers’ ability to access Canadian capital markets;
  5. the modernization of the prospectus filing model applicable to investment funds;
  6. the finalization of streamlined derivatives data reporting standards;
  7. the transition to a one-day (T+1) settlement cycle, which took place on May 27, 2024; and
  8. the coming into effect of a Canadian business conduct regime for over-the-counter (“OTC”) derivatives markets.
• adapt its regulatory approaches to the transformation of the industry by:
  1. implementing a regulation that reflects guidance on disclosure of information related to total cost and performance of segregated fund investments while continuing work with the Canadian Council of Insurance Regulators (“CCIR”) and CISRO;
  2. leading the work by the Mortgage Broker Regulators’ Council of Canada to improve disclosure practices of mortgage brokers;
  3. continuing work relating to the transition of Québec mutual fund dealers to the Canadian Investment Regulatory Organization;
  4. continuing to work with the CSA in reviewing principal distributors’ practices, and subsequently in publishing the findings of the review, introducing necessary regulatory amendments, and reviewing the requirements for central counterparty clearing of OTC derivatives; and
  5. publishing a guideline on the responsible use of artificial intelligence (“AI”).
• provide decisive action and thought leadership on current and emerging issues by:
  1. contributing to the work of the Fintech Task Force of the International Organization of Securities Commissions on the regulation of crypto asset markets, risks arising from the use of AI in finance and adoption of tokenization in the financial markets;
  2. developing a stress testing tool for major regulated financial institutions;
  3. consolidating its approach to sustainable finance through its unit dedicated to the oversight and supervision of sustainable finance-related activities;
  4. together with the CSA, continuing to publish regulatory proposals to adopt climate-related disclosure requirements based on the Canadian Sustainability Standards Board standards, finalize proposed amendments relating to diversity on boards and in executive officer positions and publish updated guidance for investment funds on disclosure practices related to environmental, social and governance matters;
  5. continuing to work on the Standardized Climate Scenario Exercise to quantify the physical and transition risks associated with climate change;
  6. publishing climate-related disclosure forms for financial institutions to identify and understand climate change risks; and
  7. leading the joint CCIR-CISRO working group on climate change and natural disasters.

Orientation 3: A high-performing regulator in the pursuit of its mission

The third orientation of its Strategic Plan requires the AMF to ensure that its monitoring and supervisory tools and activities are evolving to meet current needs. Accordingly, the AMF intends to:

• continue to leverage its data and integrated risk management program to optimize its performance;
• carry out infrastructure enhancements at its data centres; and
• in connection with the SEDAR+ platform, continue to integrate its main internal operational processes into the platform and, together with the CSA, work on the maintenance and stabilization of the platform and to replace the System for Electronic Disclosure by Insiders (SEDI) and the National Registration Database (NRD).

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