SECP Announces Third Cohort Under its Regulatory Sandbox

The Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP) has announced the launch of the third cohort of its Regulatory Sandbox. The deadline for applications submission is May 31, 2022. The Regulatory Sandbox – now successfully entering its third edition – is a tailored regulatory environment that allows entities to conduct limited-scale live tests of innovative products, services, processes, and business models in a controlled environment. In the previous two cohorts, SECP successfully ran with ideas in the areas of security token offerings (STOs), blockchain/distributed ledger solutions for capital markets, digital identity/AML/KYC, artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and robotic processes automation based solutions. In the upcoming third cohort, preference will be given to ideas related to digital-only asset management companies, digital platforms for private placement of debt instruments, AI-based algorithmic trading platforms, gender-specific facilitation such as women-specific exchange-traded funds (ETFs), AI and data analytics-based credit scoring and other decision making. Female entrepreneurs and teams with leading female participants are highly encouraged to apply. Applications for business models already approved/disapproved by SECP in the first and second cohorts will generally not be accepted for evaluation in the third cohort. Successful applicants will be allowed to test and experiment with their innovative ideas and solutions generally for not more than six months. Upon completion of the experimentation period, the entities registered in Sandbox will submit a detailed completion report to SECP, following which future course of action for the tested solutions will be determined.