Market infrastructure - Estonia
Institutions and organisation
Tallinn Stock Exchange (Nasdaq Tallinn) - (www.nasdaqbaltic.com)
The Tallinn Stock Exchange was founded in 1995.
Nasdaq Tallinn is the only regulated secondary securities market in Estonia. Nasdaq Tallinn is a self-regulated organisation, issuing and enforcing its own Rules and Regulations consistent with standard exchange operating procedures. Nasdaq Tallinn is licensed and supervised by the Financial Supervisory Authority of Estonia. Nasdaq Tallinn has been member of the Nordic-Baltic stock exchange alliance NOREX since April 2004.
Nasdaq Tallinn uses the INET trading system for trading in equities. Recognised as the most advanced securities trading technology in the world, INET is Nadsaq's core technology used on all Nasdaq equity markets across the world. For trading in fixed income securities, the Baltic and Nordic exchanges use the Genium INET trading system.
Nasdaq has its own Guarantee Fund, consisting of monetary contributions from the members of the Nasdaq Tallinn, was created to fulfil transactions. The guarantee fund can generally be used if a Nasdaq Tallinn member who is a party to a transaction goes bankrupt or does not have sufficient securities or funds to complete the transaction.
Guarantee Fund (www.tf.es)
The Guarantee Fund Act was implemented on 1 July 2002.
Under the conditions of the Guarantee Fund Act, the objective of the Guarantee Fund is to guarantee the protection of funds deposited by clients of credit institutions (“depositors”), clients of investment institutions (“investors”) and unit-holders of mandatory pension funds (“unit-holders”), and thereby to increase the reliability and stability of the financial sector.
The responsibilities of the Guarantee Fund are as follows:
- To collect single and quarterly contributions from depositors, investors and management companies of mandatory pension funds (“pension management companies”);
- Under the conditions, to the extent and pursuant to the procedure provided by this Act:
- To compensate depositors for deposits placed thereby with depositors;
- To compensate investors for their investments;
- To compensate for any damage caused by a pension management company to unit-holders;
- To perform other duties arising from this Act.
Nasdaq CSD SE (www.nasdaqcsd.com)
Nasdaq CSD was established through the merger of the Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian central securities depositories in 2017. Nasdaq CSD is licensed under the European CSDR and supervised by Baltic regulatory institutions cooperating in accordance with the CSDR.
Although on the same IT platform, Nasdaq CSD operates with three parallel securitites settlements systems (SSS). All SSSs are governed by a common set of rules, with local specifics for each SSS indicated in an addendum of the common rules.
Nasadaq CSD is authorised by the Latvian Financial and Capital Market Commission to provide CSD services in Latvia under the CSDR, and in Estonia and Lithuania via its Estonian and Lithuanian branches. Nasdaq CSD acts as the operator of the Lithuanian securities settlements system, which is governed by Lithuanian laws. Through Nasdaq CSD, market participants are provided with an environment for carrying out transactions with securities, settlement of securities transactions and registration of securities. Cash is cleared through the TARGET2 system.
The depository is a 100% owned subsidiary of Nasdaq Nordic Ltd, a stock exchange holding company in Finalnd.
Regulatory structure
Financial Supervision Authority (www.fi.ee)
The Estonian Financial Supervision Authority (Finantsinspektsioon) is a financial supervision institution with autonomous competence and a separate budget. The management acts and submits reports pursuant to the procedure in the Financial Supervision Authority Act. The Financial Supervision Authority conducts financial supervision in the name of the state and is independent in the conduct of financial supervision.
The Financial Supervisory Authority conducts state supervision over the banks, insurance companies, insurance intermediaries, investment firms, management companies, investment and pension funds as well as the payment service providers, e-money institutions, small loan offices, securities market that have been authorised by the Financial Supervision Authority and issuers of securities. The supervision authority of the domicile of a bank, an insurance company or an investment firm conducts primary supervision over the branches of the banks, insurance companies and investment firms operating in Estonia.
National Central Bank (www.eestipank.ee)
The Bank of Estonia (Eesti Pank) is the Central Bank of Estonia. It was established on 24 February 1919 by a decision of the Provisional Government of Estonia, on the basis of which the Statutes of the Bank were also approved.
Eesti Pank is administered by the Bank of Estonia (Eesti Pank) Act and its functions are directly established within the Estonian Constitution. Eesti Pank operates independently of other government agencies. Eesti Pank reports on its activites to the Estonian Parliament (Riigikogu) and is not subordinate to to the Government of the Republic or any other executive agency of the government or to any thrid party. The primary aim of Eesti Pank is to guarantee price stability in Estonia by fulfilling the following core tasks:
- Participating in Estonian economic policy by implementing independent monetary policies, consulting the government and fostering international co-operation;
- Supervising financial stability by forming financial sector policies and maintaining reliable and effective payment systems.
- Arranging cash circulation in Estonia.
- Promoting the stability of the financial system and to exercise macro-prudential supervision over the financial system.
In addition to these core tasks, Eesti Pank is actively involved in securing full membership to the European Economic and Monetary Union.