A U.K. investor lobby group, The Association of British Insurers, called for additional resitrictions on the power of majority shareholders of companies planning to go public to help strengthen confidence in U.K.'s capital markets.
Association of British Insurers said in a statement that investors that have more than 30% stake in a company that is planning to go public should make public how they will act to make certain the company is operated independently after the market debut. Regulators should get powers to sanction shareholders if the companies don't comply with those pledges, the association said.
"Discouraging controlling shareholders who are not willing to take on additional responsibility from listing on the London market is a good outcome for the quality of companies that list here," the Association of British Insurers said.
The statement follows a sequence of controversies concerning businesses such as Kazakhstan's Eurasian Natural Resources Corp., which even while currently publicly traded in London is heavy controlled and dictated upon by a very small group of Kazakh billionaires. The London-based Association of British Insurers, whose members' investments are estimated to be worth around GBP1.8 trillion or US$2.8 trillion, is encouraging the modernization of Britain's corporate governance rules to stop the unfair practices. The Financial Conduct Authority in the country had already planned to release new governance rules for public companies in coming months.
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