The Listing Act package, definitively approved by the EU Council on October 8, following a provisional agreement with the Parliament in February 2024 and the plenary vote on April 24, has now been published in the EU Official Journal and will come into force in 20 days.
The new legislative package consists of a regulation that amends the prospectus regulation, the market abuse regulation, and the regulation on financial instruments markets; a directive amending MiFID II and repealing the directive establishing listing rules on Union markets; and a directive on multiple voting shares.
While the provisions in the regulation are immediately integrated into the national laws of the 27 member states, they will have 18 months to transpose the directive amending MiFID II into national legislation and two years to transpose the directive on multiple voting shares.
What the Listing Act Package Entails
Proposed by the European Commission in December 2022, the Listing Act comprises measures aimed at simplifying the rules applicable to companies undertaking the listing process or already listed on the EU public markets.
Specifically, the newly published package in the Journal has two main objectives: on one hand, it aims to reduce bureaucratic burdens and costs for already listed issuers, and on the other, it seeks to facilitate and encourage initial access to these markets for issuers, particularly small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).
