Capital Ideas 2008 - Message from Doug Hyndman
The BC Securities Commission’s job is to protect investors and support fair, efficient, and innovative capital markets. Helping investors protect themselves is a key part of our work. Informed and empowered investors can avoid pitfalls, hold market professionals accountable, and contribute to a well-functioning market.
We deliver general investor education through our InvestRight website and programs and through our high school teaching resource, The City, which provides financial life skills education for grade 10 students in British Columbia and across Canada. These education programs complement and reinforce our other regulatory activities aimed at protecting investors.
To help investors, we need to understand their wants and needs. Today we release the results of research we commissioned to help us understand the challenges facing investors in the 21st century, building on two earlier studies with our CSA colleagues into investors’ knowledge and experience of fraud.
Capital Ideas 2008 brings together a panel of experts from diverse backgrounds to discuss the survey results and broader questions about investors today. The market turmoil of the past year has caused confusion and anxiety among both investors and market professionals, so it is an opportune time to have this discussion. We look forward to hearing your views on a number of difficult questions in relation to the research.
Effective regulation requires a partnership among the regulator, investors, and market professionals. Learning more about the challenges facing investors will help us make sure that 21st century regulation is up to the task, so we can deliver on our part of the partnership.
Our goal today is to have a discussion involving all of the partners to advance the cause of effective, investor-focused securities regulation. Discussion will focus on both problems and solutions. We hope that you will find the research presented relevant to real market problems that concern you, and that you will join in the discussion.
About Doug Hyndman
Doug Hyndman is an advocate of focused securities regulation that ensures effective investor protection and market integrity and supports efficient capital markets. As chair of the British Columbia Securities Commission since 1987, he has steered the regulation of securities in the province through a period of profound change in the markets. He has recently spoken out to correct misinformation about securities law enforcement in Canada. After receiving a BA (Econ) from the University of British Columbia and an MBA from the Richard Ivey School of Business at the University of Western Ontario, he joined the BC Ministry of Finance in 1975, serving in various positions within the Treasury Board staff division. Between 1984 and 1987, he was assistant deputy minister with responsibility for advising the government on economic, fiscal, budgetary and tax policy.
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