New Automated Trading Platform for Stock Exchange of Mauritius
On 19th May 2022, the Stock Exchange of Mauritius went live with a brand-new Automated Trading System, Avento. On the same date, its new online trading app (mySEM) went live too. It’s state of the art, enabling the Stock Exchange of Mauritius to build on its past innovation. The new platform features:
- A great new front-end for brokers
- A new mySEM app for investors
“Economic Development and Wealth Creation”
It opened with a speech from Honourable Minister Mahen Kumar Seeruttun. He said it was a great development for Mauritius, recognising the contribution of investment to wealth creation. It is expected to further develop the country’s economy.
Further, he pointed out how the new automated system will both modernise Mauritius market ecosystem and create a more liberal market. It is hoped long-term not just to compete with the international marketplace and keep it relevant, but to maintain the gains the country has made recently.
It is “imperative for us to remain at par with global best practices and front-line developments in technology and business models.”
Also in the speech, he claimed that Mauritius is now redefining what a capital market means for the country. In future, it is expected that a derivatives’ component will become available through the platform once it has met the defined preconditions for doing so.
He compared capital markets to a four-legged table where the legs represent:
- Securities market – shares and bonds
- Banking industry – loans and payments
- Insurance and pensions – collateral and future income
- Derivatives markets – risk management
What’s more, the system will now be better equipped to allow the Surveillance Team to identify irregular trading activity such as system abuse, manipulation in the markets, and other unusual activity. They can now identify this type of activity in real-time. This will also aid the FSC supervision of the SEM.
A Fully Digital Market
A number of useful features on the app will help investors and brokers alike. It isn’t just about going digital for a digital age, there are genuinely useful tools to empower investors in Mauritius and abroad. In a world where timing is everything, the app permits:
- Real-time market monitoring for investors
- Order real-time accounts
- Interactive charts of a company’s shares over the previous year
The SEM’s Chief Executive, Mr Sunil Benimadhu, announced these measures in his own speech at the launch of Avento and mySEM.
STT – a global exchange tech solution for financial markets around the world, powers Avento which is the new platform on which mySEM is built. Previously, mySEM used SEMATS. Mr Benimadhu is confident that this is a good move as he explained why the change was a good one.
- A grant from the SEM to AfDB funded implementation
- Innovation drove this change to better serve all stakeholders – including data vendors, issuers, regulators, and investors
- Avento will undoubtedly help SEM’s desire for internationalisation
On the matter of internationalisation, Avento will help in four key areas:
- To improve Stock Exchange of Mauritius’ attractiveness for Exchange Traded Funds (ETF’s).
- Permit international brokers to connect to Stock Exchange of Mauritius, thereby permitting more international interest to the market and improve liquidity
- Stock Exchange of Mauritius is now one of seven African Exchanges chosen to be part of the African Exchanges Linkage Project. These exchanges aim to improve financial integration across the African continent and improve secondary market liquidity throughout. The integration will be facilitated by Avento and further enhance international order flows, not just for Stock Exchange of Mauritius, but other African Exchanges too
- Finally, and as mentioned earlier in this article, Avento enables Stock Exchange of Mauritius to utilize derivatives space and plan for further developments in markets such as foreign underlying and futures
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