The SEC has approved revisions to the regulations supporting the establishment of the Green Investment Trust in Thailand. This is aimed at funding environmental projects in the forestry and agriculture sectors to help maintain greenhouse gas levels. Additionally, the SET has amended its securities trading regulations.
The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Board, at its meeting No. 9/2024 on 1 August 2024, has passed a resolution approving the proposed revision to the principles for the issuance of regulations to support the establishment and management of Green Investment Trust (GIT) to allow such investment product to facilitate and support investment in environmental projects to maintain greenhouse gas in activities in forestry or agricultural sectors. This is one of the mechanisms supporting the environmental sustainability development goals and promote creation of biodiversity in Thailand.
GIT is a trust for capital market transactions with the objectives of investing and seeking benefits from environmental projects to alleviate or maintain greenhouse gas according to the criteria as specified by the Capital Market Supervisory Board (CMSB), which includes the investment policy, the seeking of benefits, and the types of investors. Furthermore, GIT does not seek benefits specifically from managing private assets of any persons or groups of persons (private trust), nor does it aim to evade compliance with any relevant laws.
Key products for GIT investment in environmental projects are: (1) ownership or land leasing right only for activities in forestry and agricultural sectors to keep carbon volume sufficient for complying with the criteria of Thailand Greenhouse Gas Management Organization (Public Organization) (TGO), and (2) rights under the contract for future revenue sharing of the projects under (1), in which case the land must be located in Thailand and at least is registered in the Verified Carbon Standard Project with TGO or complies with other international carbon credit standards widely recognized.
In this regard, the SEC will draft relevant regulations for the establishment and management of GIT and conduct a public hearing on this matter to seek comments and suggestions from stakeholders and the general public.
Concurrently, the SEC Board’s meeting has also approved the amendments to the securities trading regulations to enhance market orderliness, as proposed by the Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET), with the key points as follows: (1) Increasing the Dynamic Price Band on a per-security basis, (2) Implementing an Auction trading method for securities under Trading Alert, Level 2 or higher, and (3) Implementing an Auto Pause on a per-security basis upon an abnormally high volume of trading orders.
Due to these amendments to the relevant regulations involving the implementation of entirely new measures, it becomes appropriate for the SET to communicate those newly deployed measures to investors before launching them to the public and to monitor their effectiveness in the next six months after their implementation. This is to ensure that the measures are suitable and conducive to orderly trading activities.
