Parliament is expected to debate amendments to legislation to make the domestic investment market more efficient and transparent in an expedited procedure by as soon as April, ruling Fidesz group leader Antal Rogán has said, after the recent brokerage scandals. The market watchdog needs more effective tools, such as the power to conduct more frequent reviews and enact consumer protection measures, Rogán told business daily Napi Gazdaság. Oversight commissioners ought to be able to check up on companies even after problems were cleared up. Rogán said he supported allowing the National Bank as financial market regulator, to involve outside consultants, making possible more thorough reviews. Efforts should be made for the owners of brokerage firms to provide compensation for the losses incurred from abuses and law breaches, even out of their own pockets. Rogán said, however, that if someone places assets with a brokerage rather than in a bank, the assumed risks are higher. For this reason the National Deposit Insurance Fund, which insures bank deposits, guarantees the funds up to 30 million forints and the Investment Protection Fund for up to 6 million forints. The bond-holders of the Quaestor Group should be compensated by the financial sector, Rogan told the paper. He said the state-owned Hungarian Development Bank will suffer losses from a 17 billion forint loan it extended to the Quaestor Group under the Gyurcsány government. Rogan said the group had received the loan without the provision of sufficient guarantees, and it should be examined how this could have happened. He added that it took two years, from 2010 to 2012, under the Fidesz government, for contracts to be changed so that collateral is placed behind the loan, but these may still prove insufficient.
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