Overview

The Aquis Stock Exchange (AQSE) (link to AQSE Ex­change website) is a stock market providing primary and secondary markets for equity and debt products. Aquis Exchange is authorised and regulated by the UK Financial Conduct Authority and France’s Autorité des Marchés Financiers to operate Multilateral Trading Facility businesses in the UK (Aquis Exchange UK) and in EU27 (Aquis Exchange Europe) respectively.

AQSE operates two primary traded markets and a single secondary traded market:

• The AQSE Main Market is a UK Regulated Market for securities admitted to the UK Official List.  Companies listed on the AQSE Main Market are subject to the AQSE Main Market Admission and Disclosure Standards (primary market).
• The AQSE Growth Market is a primary market with a regulatory environment designed to meet the needs of small and mid-cap issuers wishing to obtain a quotation on a public market to access growth capital. The AQSE Growth Market is a multilateral trading facility and is registered as an SME growth market. However, it is not a UK regulated market and securities admitted to trading on the AQSE Growth Market are unlisted securities.

AQSE Trading is a trading venue for listed or quoted securities admitted to trading on other EU markets.

AQSE Growth Market – fin­an­cial re­port­ing re­quire­ments

The fin­an­cial re­port­ing rules for AQSE Growth Market com­pan­ies are set out in the AQSE Growth Market Rules. There are two market segments, Access (link to AQSE Exchange website)  and Apex (link to AQSE Exchange website). The Access Rules are aimed at companies that are at an earlier stage in their growth and the Apex Rules are aimed at more established companies. These rules permit financial statements to be prepared in accordance with UK GAAP, IFRS Accounting Standards or an equivalent third country GAAP.  In summary:

• The financial information must be prepared in accordance with IFRS Accounting Standards, UK GAAP, US GAAP or such other standard as may be agreed with the Exchange for third country issuers. If such third country’s national accounting standards are not equivalent to IFRS Accounting Standards, UK GAAP or US GAAP, the financial statements shall be restated in IFRS Accounting Standards.
• Audited annual accounts in respect of each financial year must be announced as soon as possible and, in any event, not later than six months after the end of the period to which they relate.
• Interim results in respect of the first half of each financial year must be announced as soon as possible and in any event not later than three months after the end of the relevant period. The interim report must be prepared on a basis consistent with the accounting policies which will be applied by the issuer in its next annual accounts.
• In the event of a modified audit report on going concern, management statements for each quarter of the issuer’s financial year must be announced by the issuer until an audit report in respect of a subsequent annual financial report is published without modification.

Ap­plic­ab­il­ity of FCA rules to AQSE Growth Market com­pan­ies

The AQSE Growth Market is not classified as a UK regulated market under the Companies Act 2006, and AQSE Growth Market securities are not admitted to UK Official List. AQSE Growth Market companies are hence not subject to the Listing Rules. They are also not gen­er­ally subject to the Dis­clos­ure Guidance and Trans­par­ency Rules, with the ex­cep­tion of DTR 5 (link to FCA hand­book) (major share­hold­ing and vote holder no­ti­fic­a­tions) which applies dir­ectly to UK in­cor­por­ated AQSE Ex­change Growth Market com­pan­ies.

The FCA Prospectus Rules (link to FCA hand­book) do not apply unless a company makes a public of­fer­ing of se­cur­it­ies. This means that many AQSE Growth Market com­pan­ies who are first ad­mit­ted to the AQSE Growth Market will instead prepare an Ad­mis­sion Doc­u­ment.