| 4 |
The TPEx case handler shall inspect the TPEx Stock Listing Review Form (Attachment 1) and the related evidentiary documents to ascertain whether the applicant company meets the requirements for TPEx listing under Article 4 of the Foreign Security Review Rules. If the company is an investment holding company, the case handler shall review the Investment Holding Company Qualification Review Form (Attachment 2) and related documents to ascertain whether it meets the qualifications for TPEx listing for companies of that type under Article 20 of the Foreign Security Review Rules.
The TPEx case handler shall also fill out a Shareholder Distribution and Custody Commitments Review Form (Attachment 3), reviewing whether the applicant company's shareholder distribution and custody commitments meet the following conditions:
- That the ratio of shares the applicant company plans to have underwritten conforms with TPEx rules.
- That the applicant company's shareholder distribution meets the standards of Article 4 of the Foreign Security Review Rules; if it does not, whether the applicant company is committed to reaching those standards prior to listing.
- That the percentages of shares to be placed in centralized custody for directors, supervisors, and shareholders with holdings of ten percent or more and related commitments conform with TPEx rules.
The TPEx case handler shall also inspect the Legal Issues Review Form (Attachment 4) that the applicant company filled out in conjunction with a Taiwan attorney to ascertain the following matters:
- If the laws of the company's country of registration place restrictions on the locations where shareholders meetings may be convened or on voting systems or other forms of exercise of shareholder rights, whether such restrictions would affect the exercise of rights by shareholders of the applicant company. If so, the applicant company shall describe any measures it has for guaranteeing exercise of rights by Taiwan domestic shareholders, and those measures shall be assessed by an attorney.
- The applicant company shall adopt concrete provisions in its articles of incorporation or organizational documents guaranteeing the exercise of shareholder rights.
- Whether the applicant company, in the year of its listing for TPEx trading and in the following 2 fiscal years, has continued to engage a lead recommending securities firm to assist the foreign issuer in complying with Taiwan's securities laws and regulations, TPEx rules and public announcement matters, and the foreign issuer's TPEx primary listing contract.
|
| 5 |
In reviewing whether any of the circumstances of the subparagraphs of Article 9, paragraph 1 of the Foreign Security Review Rules apply to the applicant company, the TPEx case handler shall perform a secondary review of the Form for Review of the Circumstances Under the Subparagraphs of Article 9, paragraph 1 of the Foreign Security Review Rules (Attachment 5) filled out by the lead recommending securities firm, the review procedures it used, and the conclusion of the evaluation.
The case handler shall review whether the recommending securities firm performed its evaluation in accordance with the following procedures:
- Whether the circumstances of Article 156, paragraph 1, subparagraphs 1 through 3 of the Securities and Exchange Act are present:
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain an attorney's legal opinion, and shall perform a second review of the applicant company's minutes of the board of directors and shareholders meetings, financial reports, and account books in order to assess whether the applicant company has any involvement in litigation or non-litigious matters whose outcome would cause the company to dissolve or would cause any change in its organization, capital, operations planning, or financial status, or that would cause it to cease production, and whether there would be a resulting likelihood of affecting the market order or the public interest.
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain an attorney's legal opinion, and shall perform a second review of the applicant company's minutes of the board of directors and shareholders meetings, financial reports, and account books in order to assess whether the applicant company has suffered any major disaster, signed important contracts, had any unusual accidents, changed important content in its operations plan, or had a check refused, the result of which would cause a marked, material change in the company's financial status, and whether there would be a resulting likelihood of affecting the market order or the public interest.
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain an attorney's legal opinion in order to ascertain whether the applicant company has made any misrepresentation or violated any law in a way which would influence the price of its securities and further create the likelihood of affecting the market order or the public interest.
- Whether finances or operations are clearly separate and independent of others:
- The assessment and auditing procedures implemented by the recommending securities firm shall be sufficient to support its assessment conclusion regarding whether the applicant company's sources of funding show an overconcentration in non-financial institutions and whether it shares a line of credit with another entity such that the two cannot be clearly separated.
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain an attorney's legal opinion in order to assess whether the applicant company has signed any contracts with others which would materially restrict its operation or which are obviously unreasonable.
- Whether the company is involved in any non-arms-length transactions which have not been rectified by the time of the application:
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain the basic company information and the terms of trade for the top ten consumers of the applicant company's goods and its top ten suppliers, and shall perform an analysis, for the year of the application and the 2 preceding years, of the major consumers of the applicant company's products and the trends in price changes as well as its major materials suppliers and related trends in price changes, in order to determine whether the transactions between the applicant company and its suppliers and the consumers of its goods exhibit any differences with normal transactions or any obviously unreasonable aspects.
- The recommending securities firm shall undertake assessment procedures with respect to related-party transactions of a material amount or of an unusual nature (including comparisons with same-industry transactions and transactions between the applicant company and non-related parties) in order to ascertain the necessity of such transactions, the legality of the decision-making process, and the reasonableness of the price and the circumstances of the payment and receipt of funds.
- The recommending securities firm shall apprise itself of whether there are receivables in material amounts overdue from affiliated enterprises; if so, the recommending securities firm shall ascertain the reason and whether there are any irregularities in terms of interest rates and the circumstances of receipt and payment of interest.
- If there are any large transfers of money between the applicant company and affiliated enterprises, shareholders, or related parties, the recommending securities firm shall ascertain the reasons and whether there are any irregularities in terms of interest rates and receipts and payments of interest.
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain an attorney's legal opinion and shall adopt any other necessary assessment and auditing procedure with respect to whether the applicant company or the persons serving as directors, supervisors, general manager, and de facto responsible person at the time of application committed any acts in violation of the principle of good faith within the last 3 years.
- Whether the applicant company's board of directors or supervisors are able to execute their duties independently:
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain information with which it can demonstrate that the applicant company meets the following requirements:
- The applicant company shall have at least five directors on the board of directors, among whom at least two shall be independent directors, at least one of which is domiciled in Taiwan.
- The applicant company shall choose to establish either an audit committee or supervisors. The audit committee shall be composed of the entire number of independent directors. It shall not be fewer than three persons in number, one of whom shall be committee convener. Supervisors shall not be fewer than three persons in number.
- More than half of the directors of the applicant company shall mutually be free of, and at least one or more of the supervisors shall mutually be free of, any relationship of the kind set out in Article 14, paragraph 1, subparagraph 3 of the Foreign Security Review Rules.
- Representatives of the same juristic person may not serve concurrently as director and supervisor of the applicant company; and at least one or more director and supervisor seats shall mutually be free of any relationship of the kind set out in Article 14, paragraph 1, subparagraph 3 of the Foreign Security Review Rules.
- The recommending securities firm shall assess the requirements for actual independence for each of the independent directors in accordance with the Regulations Governing Appointment of Independent Directors and Compliance Matters for Public Companies.
- Evidentiary documents shall be obtained showing attendance at professional development courses by the independent directors.
- Whether there is any serious deterioration in the business it operates
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain relevant information, in order to support the reasonableness of the enterprises sampled for the comparison and to find out the status of other enterprises in the same industry, and shall review whether there is any serious deterioration in the operating revenue, operating income, and net income before tax of the applicant company, compared with enterprises in the same industry for the most recent fiscal year and the fiscal year of application for TPEx listing.
- The recommending securities firm shall review the reasons for the changes in the operating revenue, operating income, and net income before tax of the applicant company for the most recent three fiscal years. If there is continuing negative growth, the recommending securities firm shall obtain the applicant company's improvement plan, and evaluate its feasibility and reasonableness, and the improvement benefits.
- The recommending securities firm shall obtain supporting data such as research reports of relevant industry or expert opinions, in order to evaluate whether the applicant company's products or technology are outdated and their development prospects. If the applicant company's products or technology are already outdated, the recommending securities firm shall obtain other improvement plans and evaluate the improvement plans' feasibility and reasonableness.
When an investment holding company applies for TPEx listing, the recommending securities firm shall undertake the assessment procedures set out in subparagraphs 1 through 4 of the preceding paragraph for each of the holding company subsidiaries.
If assessment of the applicant company discovers the circumstances of any subparagraph of Article 9, paragraph of the Foreign Security Review Rules, the TPEx shall add its opinion, and shall add detailed explanatory notes in the review report and the working papers for the review.
|
| 6 |
When the TPEx case handler reviews whether the applicant company conforms with the provisions of Articles 18 and 19 of the Foreign Security Review Rules regarding applications for TPEx listing by consortiums, the case handler shall perform a second review of the individual items already assessed by the recommending securities firm in accordance with regulations relating to consortiums, and issue a review conclusion on that basis.
|
| 7 |
In reviewing the CPA's attestation procedures, the case handler shall perform a further review of the Form for Secondary Review of CPA Attestation Procedures that was filled out by the CPA (Attachment 6), with attention to the following matters:
- Whether audit reports have been issued for the financial reports prepared by the applicant company during the year of application and the preceding 2 years by two Taiwan CPAs approved by the competent authority for attestation of the financial reports of public companies, or whether those financial reports have been audited and attested by an international accounting firm that has a cooperative relationship with the accounting firm of the aforementioned CPAs along with an audit report additionally issued by a Taiwan CPA.
- If any of the following circumstances have applied to the attesting CPA of the applicant company, then another CPA shall be engaged to audit and attest the financial reports of the applicant company for the year of the application and the preceding 2 years:
- The CPA has received a disciplinary action or disposition equal or greater in severity to a warning by the competent authority during the preceding 2 years or the year of application for TPEx listing, provided that this will not apply when the disciplinary action or disposition was a warning or a reprimand, and the cause of the warning or reprimand occurred over 5 years prior to the date of application for TPEx listing.
- The CPA has accumulated two or more demerits, during the year prior to the application for TPEx listing, from the TPEx and the TWSE in accordance with their respective Regulations for Handling Deficiencies in Certified Public Accountants' Reviews of TPEx Stock Listing Applications and Regulations Governing the Handling of Errors by Certified Public Accountants in Auditing of Initial Applications for Market Listing.
- The audit report shall state the accounting principles that were adopted by the foreign issuer and the differences between those accounting principles and the International Financial Reporting Standards endorsed by the competent authority, with indexed footnotes. It shall also state that auditing was performed in accordance with Taiwan's Regulations Governing Auditing and Certification of Financial Statements by Certified Public Accountants and generally accepted accounting principles.
- The attesting CPA must issue an audit report made without reference to the auditing work of other CPAs.
- If an audit report was issued with anything other than an unqualified opinion, the reviewer shall ascertain the related facts and reasons.
- If the attesting CPA was changed during the year of the application or the preceding 2 years, the review shall ascertain the related facts and reasons.
The review reports issued by the attesting CPA for second quarter financial reports shall conform with the provisions of the preceding paragraph.
|
| 8 |
A second review shall be performed for the financial reports of the year of application and the preceding 2 years, with attention to the following matters:
- The financial reports shall be prepared in Chinese and in New Taiwan Dollar units.
- The financial reports shall have been audited and attested or reviewed by a CPA, and include balance sheets, statements of comprehensive income, statements of changes in equity, cash flow statements, and notes.
- The financial reports shall have been signed or stamped with the seals of the chairman of the board of directors, managerial officers, and chief accounting officer.
- The aforementioned financial reports shall have been approved by the board of directors; when there are discrepancies between those reports and the financial reports for the most recent 2 years that the ordinary shareholders meeting recognized, however, the financial reports recognized by the ordinary shareholders meeting shall be obtained.
- The explanation of material changes in account titles in the applicant company's public prospectus shall be inspected, along with the information in the CPA's permanent files used for financial analysis and the assessment opinion of the recommending securities firm, and a comprehensive analysis shall be undertaken of the financial reports individually and in comparison with same-sector enterprises, in order to understand any changing trends in the applicant company's financial status and profitability and whether there are any irregularities. A Form for Comprehensive Analysis of Financial Information shall be filled out (Attachment 7).
- When there are account titles of an exceptional nature in a financial report , and the amount is large, the CPA's working papers shall be reviewed in order to understand the reason for their occurrence and whether there are any material irregularities.
- The status of improvement with respect to any matters in the financial reports for which the competent authority issued a letter with instructions for adjustment or improvement.
- The notes to the financial reports shall state which accounting principles are used; if the reports are not prepared according to the International Financial Reporting Standards endorsed by the competent authority, a second review shall be performed of disclosures in the notes regarding discrepancies with the International Financial Reporting Standards endorsed by the competent authority as applied in the period-on-period balance sheets and statements of comprehensive income, including any material discrepancies and the monetary amounts affected by them, in order to understand their nature and draw conclusions.
Case handlers shall acquire a general understanding of the recent operations of the applicant company and the financial forecast information that the applicant company provides, which shall only be used in connection with the review of the application at issue and may not be made known or disclosed to outside parties.
|
| 9 |
The TPEx case handler shall inspect the applicant company's statement of internal control, and that it has obtained a CPA's special audit report with an unqualified opinion.
A secondary review shall be performed of the CPA's internal control system special audit report working papers in connection with the applicant company's purchase and payment cycles and sales and collection cycles, in order to understand the status of the applicant company's adoption and implementation of its internal control system, and to understand whether the CPA has carried out proper audit procedures that are sufficient to support the audit conclusions of its internal control system special audit report.
For an investment holding company applying for TPEx listing, the reviewer shall gain an understanding of the circumstances of the audit and the conclusions of the attesting CPA with respect to the internal control systems of each of the holding company's subsidiaries.
|
| 10 |
The format of the applicant company's preliminary prospectus shall be inspected item-by-item for conformity with the Regulations Governing Information to be Published in Prospectuses for Applications for Sale of Securities on the TPEx and related laws and regulations. A second review shall be performed for the Legal Issues Review Form (Attachment 4) that was filled out by the applicant company in consultation with a Taiwan attorney, to understand reasons for the occurrence of any irregularities noted by the attorney and their effect on the applicant company.
|
| 11 |
A second review shall be performed to determine that the audit procedures used by the recommending securities firm for its assessment report conformed to the Assessment and Auditing Procedures for Recommending Securities Firms Handling Applications for TPEx Listing of Stocks, that the Recommending Securities Firm's Assessment Report (Attachment 8) was prepared in conformance with the Directions Governing the Particulars to be Recorded in Underwriter Evaluation Reports for Applications for TPEx Listing of Securities, that the report contains a clear and concrete conclusion, and that it has been jointly signed by the recommending securities firms.
|
| 12 |
A second review shall be performed of the recommending securities firm's audit procedures with respect to the following matters, and its conclusions regarding their influence on the operation of the company; for investment holding companies applying for TPEx listing, those matters shall be reviewed for each of the holding company's subsidiaries:
- Whether there were any material labor-management disputes during the year of application and the 2 preceding years.
- Whether, within the past 3 years, any major occupational disaster occurred due to poor safety and health facilities; or whether the company received a disposition ordering a partial or total suspension of operations due to a violation of labor safety and health laws in the applicant company's country of registration.
|
| 13 |
The recommending securities firm shall issue a declaration stating that its report neither concealed nor misrepresented any matter.
|
| 14 |
Reviewers shall gain an understanding of whether the competent authority has issued a letter indicating any matters for attention with regard to the applicant company, the reasons for their occurrence, their effect on the applicant company, and the status of improvement with regard to those matters.
|