New SRO must ‘provide a better investor experience’

“For those advisors who sell mutual funds and have been deemed proficient by the MFDA, there should be no change because they’ve been serving their investors’ needs appropriately.”

The CSA is developing a single SRO which will merge the MFDA and IIROC. Paglia was commenting on the two staff notices and requests for comment that CSA issued: 25-304 Application for Recognition of New Self-Regulatory Organizations and 25-305 Application for Approval of the New Investor Protection Fund.

“This is an entire SRO system from an advisor perspective for their clients. It should, ultimately, all be judged from the client experience. It should provide a seamless way to move from platform to platform at a practice level,” she said, noting that means the CSA will need to remove barriers and merge the platform technologically as well as put the SRO rules in place without unnecessary administration or cost and without causing confusion for investors.

“The point of this was that we don’t want multiple regulators doing the same thing. So, we have advocated for not fettering the discretion of this new SRO and giving it a chance to grow and establish itself because both IIROC and MFDA are established regulators,” she said.

She added that before the new system comes into place, now expected in in January, IIAC wants reasonable consultation and implementation timelines, and “we want a truly new, fresh, consolidated SRO as opposed to two separate systems coexisting with no real change and administration attached to anyone who’s trying to combine their platforms. That’s the goal.”