Ethics and governance in the European Financial centers

The Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA) is the single regulator for financial services activities in Malta. It regulates and supervises credit and financial institutions, investment, trust and insurance business and also houses the country's Companies Registry.
Since January 2, 2004, the MFSA informs the public of all breaches of financial services licence conditions which have given rise to the imposition of a fine or any other administrative measure, giving the name of the licence holder and the sanction imposed by the Authority. The publication of this information takes place only after the exhaustion of all possible appeals at law from the decision of the Authority.
There are not many cases and the amount of fines is not dissuasive enough (Lm 100 up to to Lm 1000 i.e. EUR 233 up to EUR 2330).

See website

Margaret Cole, Director of Enforcment, FSA, was invited this week at Fordham Law School, New York
She explained why the FSA is so credible in its assignments as regulator.
She explained notably that own procedures enable them to impose unlimited fines, to alter or withdraw a person or a firm's ability to conduct regulated activities, or even to prohibit (ban) them from the industry altogether.
The FSA actively looks for new ways to make sure its penalties bring about the deterrent effect the FSA wants to achieve. This means considering not only the types and levels of penalties the FSA imposes but making sure that the penalties impact upon the right people

See speech

The ALFI (Association Luxembourgeoise des Fonds d’Investissement) is the official representative body for the Luxembourg investment fund industry and was set up in November 1988 to promote its development. It published récently a brochure in French about careers in the investment funds.

It is interesting to observe the expected profiles for the compliance officers and internal auditors positions.

The qualities for the internal auditor are the following:
University diploma in economic and financial sciences or of accountancy
Open to acquire specific qualifications
Bilingual, even trilingual
Ambitious, motivated
Team spirit
Excellent relational capacities

The qualities for the compliance officer are the following:
Economic, legal or regulatory university diploma, ideally supplemented by one 3rd financial cycle high Level of professional competence in the field of banking and financial and the applicable standards
Good knowledge of the financial markets
Perfect knowledge of the general regulation and OPC industry.
Bilingual/trilingual English/French/German

It is striking that the keyword for the functions is missing in this official brochure supported at the govermental level: independence (or independent).

This is the critical quality for such jobs.

On the other hand, a quality like "Ambitious" poses a major problem: it appears incompatible with the job which precisely must take the risk if necessary to be opposed even if it means to bring into play the position : an ambitious guy will not oppose his management all the more that management in Luxembourg consider officially vague and ambiguous offences such as forgery, use of forgery, false balance sheet, use of false balance sheet or unauthorised use of corporate property (See ABBL report in 2003 )

In a nutshell, these functions are "formatted" in Luxembourg so that they do not disturb too much by focusing on the languages and the legal and regulatory standards (that anyway are regularly changing ). But independence is not sought.