The Government Appoints Directors to the Board of Hkex

Press release

The Government Appoints Directors to the Board of HKEx

Wednesday, April 26, 2006

The Financial Secretary today (April 26) appointed Mr Ronald Arculli, Mrs Laura Cha and Mr Moses Cheng as members of the Board of the Hong Kong Exchanges and Clearing Limited (HKEx) for a term of two years. They are appointed to replace Messrs Charles Lee, Tim Freshwater and K S Lo, who will retire from the Board of HKEx after the Annual General Meeting today.
Announcing the appointments, the Financial Secretary, Mr Henry Tang said, "Appointment to the Board of HKEx is an important safeguard of the interest of the public. Mr Arculli, Mrs Cha and Mr Cheng are well-respected and prominent figures in the financial services industry. We are glad that they have accepted the appointments and demonstrated their commitments to serve the public".
"We are most grateful to Messrs Lee, Freshwater and Lo for their dedicated service and invaluable counsel to HKEx in the past six years, especially during the initial stage of the merger of the exchanges and clearing houses. We trust that we can continue to count on their support for the future development of the securities and futures market of Hong Kong," Mr Tang said.
Mr Ronald Arculli is the Senior Partner of Arculli Fong & Ng. Mr Arculli was a member of the Securities and Futures Commission Advisory Committee in 1989-1993, and a non-executive director of the Securities and Futures Commission in 1997-2000.
Mrs Laura Cha is the Non-Executive Chairman of HSBC Investment Asia Holdings Limited. Mrs Cha was Vice-Chairman of the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) from 2001 to September 2004. Prior to her appointment to CSRC, she was Deputy Chairman of the Securities and Futures Commission from 1998 to early 2001.
Mr Moses Cheng is the Senior Partner of P C Woo & Co. He has been a member of the Listing Committee of the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong since 1996 and has become the Chairman of the Committee since April 2005.

The Board of HKEx comprises a maximum of six directors elected by shareholders, the Chief Executive of HKEx, and a maximum of six directors appointed by the Financial Secretary. The other directors appointed by the Financial Secretary are Messrs Marvin Cheung, Henry Fan and Fong Hup.
"We trust all the directors will work closely together to the best interest of both HKEx and the public as a whole," Mr Tang said.
The appointments are made under the Securities and Futures Ordinance (SFO). The Ordinance, together with HKEx's Articles of Association, empowers the Financial Secretary to appoint not more than six persons to be members of the Board of directors of HKEx where the Financial Secretary is satisfied that it is appropriate to do so in the interest of the investing public or in the public interest.
According to section 63(2)(a) of SFO, HKEx has the statutory duty to act in the interest of the public, having particular regard to the interest of the investing public.