Financial Markets Conduct (Marex) Exemption Notice 2025

The Financial Markets Conduct (Marex) Exemption Notice 2025 exempts Marex NZ Limited (Marex) from the requirement under section 310 of the Financial Markets Conduct Act 2013 (Act) to hold a licence to operate a financial product market in New Zealand, subject to conditions. 

The key reasons for granting the exemption are:

• Marex’s financial product market is simple in its format, the type of products that can be traded are limited, and the conditions of the exemption ensure that all participants are wholesale investors in accordance with clause 3(2) of Schedule 1 of the Act. 
  Accordingly, the following statutory purposes can be substantially achieved without Marex being subject to licensing requirements— 
  • promoting informed participation of businesses, investors and consumers in the financial markets; and 
  • promoting and facilitating the development of fair, efficient, and transparent financial markets; and the additional purposes of providing timely, accurate and understandable information to persons to assist those persons to make decisions relating to financial products or the provision of financial services; and the exemption is subject to conditions that 
• Marex must not, in relation to the financial product market it operates: 
  • hold client money or property; and 
  • operate any clearing and settlement facility. 

As such, it is not necessary to impose requirements in relation to those matters to achieve the purpose of the Act relating to governance arrangements and the management of governance risks; and

• granting the exemption promotes innovation and flexibility in the financial markets, by facilitating the continuation and expansion of a new financial product market with appropriate regulatory settings; and furthermore, taking into consideration:
  • the matters set out in section 308 of the Act regarding the nature of the activities conducted, the size of the market, the nature of the financial products dealt with, the participants, and the technology used; and 
  • the purpose set out in section 229 of the Act to encourage a diversity of financial product markets to take account of the differing needs and objectives of issuers and investors, 

the obligations arising out of the operation of subparts 7 and 8 of Part 5 of the Act would be out of proportion to any benefits licensing Marex may bring. Also, to subject the issuers whose products are traded on Marex’s financial product markets to listing rules and requirements would impose significant costs on both Marex and the issuers disproportionate to any benefit; and 

• the exemption is subject to conditions limiting the infrastructure of the facility, the nature of participants, the capacity in which they are participating, the range of products traded on any facility that has the benefit of the exemption, and the operation of the Electronic Trading Facility. As such, the FMA considers the exemption is not broader than reasonably necessary to address the matters that gave rise to the exemption. 

Download Financial Markets Conduct (Marex) Exemption Notice 2025 [PDF 285KB]