Disciplinary Committee at OMX Nordic Exchange Stockholm fines SSAB (1/08)

The listed company SSAB Svenskt Stål AB (“SSAB”) has contravened the rules that apply at OMX Nordic Exchange Stockholm by failing to handle price-sensitive information in the correct manner. The Exchange’s Disciplinary Committee has ruled that SSAB must pay a fine of one annual fee, which corresponds to SEK 2,201,285.

In accordance with OMX Nordic Exchange Stockholm’s listing agreement, interim reports must be published in a manner that ensures that the information is made available to the public rapidly and in a non-discriminatory manner. No later than simultaneously, the information shall be disclosed to the Exchange in the manner instructed by the Exchange and shall be made available on the company’s website as soon as possible. The listed company is obligated to ensure that information concerning the report does not “leak” in advance.

On Monday, October 29, 2007 at 12:59 p.m., SSAB published its report on the third quarter of 2007. However, information from the report had been available from the news agency Ticker as early as 12:52 p.m. As the subsequent investigation has shown, this was a result of the report being made accessible externally via SSAB’s website. This was possible because SSAB had placed a hidden draft of the quarterly report, on hold, on its website at 11:10 a.m. The first download by an external party occurred at 11:56 a.m. Through an internal inquiry, SSAB was able to determine that the company’s information security was deficient with regard to the Internet.

The Disciplinary Committee has concluded that it was evident that SSAB’s report on the third quarter of 2007 had been made accessible externally slightly more than one hour before it was published in the manner stipulated in the listing agreement. In similar cases in 2003, the Disciplinary Committee found that the listing agreement’s ban on disclosing price-sensitive information in any manner other than through correct publication also encompasses unintentional disclosure. Because the report was made accessible on the Internet, the company bears factual responsibility for disclosing the information since it would be fairly easy to work out the website address.  

Following the previous cases in 2003, the Exchange informed all listed companies about the problems that had been brought to light with regard to these matters and urged the companies to review their routines for publishing information online. The current “leak” occurred despite previous information concerning such conduct and, consequently, the Disciplinary Committee found that a warning would not be a suitable sanction this time.

The Disciplinary Committee sentenced SSAB to a fine of one annual fee, corresponding to slightly more than SEK 2.2 million.