Equitise has been licensed by the FMA as an equity crowdfunding service provider since December 22, 2014.

As a licensed equity crowdfunding service provider, Equitise was required to file audited financial statements for the year ended June 30, 2020 by October 30, 2020.

To date, the company has yet to file its financial statements but has paid a $7,500 infringement fee for the offence.

The purpose of financial statements is to provide investors and other stakeholders with useful information for decision-making purposes. For licensed crowdfunding service providers, this includes information about how the entity is performing under the licence.

Reliable and supportable financial statements must be made available to the public in a timely manner. For many reporting entities, financial statements are the only source of financial information available to investors and other stakeholders.

The FMA recently published a report regarding the regulator’s monitoring of financial reporting filing obligations.

In 2020, the FMA issued an exemption that allowed Financial Markets Conduct Act reporting entities an additional two months to file financial statements.

The FMA has a broad range of regulatory tools (both formal statutory and informal non-statutory tools) for considering the appropriate regulatory response concerning a filing breach.