Regulating market integrity: an offshore perspective

When one thinks of the abusive behaviours and the capital markets in which they have previously occurred, the ‘FTSE’, ‘NASDAQ’ and ‘EURONEX’ markets immediately come to mind. However, over the past 20 years jurisdictions such as the Cayman Islands, Mauritius and Guernsey have become centres for trading sophisticated financial instruments. A question therefore arises as to how well the offences of market manipulation and insider dealing are regulated in an offshore jurisdiction. This chapter explores the differences within abuse regulation from an offshore perspective by first charting the development of offshore capital markets and then going on to establish core benchmarking standards from MAR against which their efficacy can be judged. This chapter then discusses the regulation of market abuse in the Cayman Islands, Mauritius and Guernsey before going on to make recommendations to ensure that market integrity can be attained in offshore jurisdictions who trade in sophisticated financial instruments.