Pre-Budget Proposals discussed included Pre-Budget proposals on New Builds, Renovation, Waste, Excavation and demolition, rating of building materials.
“The development and the construction industry must improve and evolve with full respect for Malta and Gozo’s heritage, history, culture, natural environment and well-being”, Dr Marthese Portelli, The Malta Chamber CEO said during a meeting which she lead.
Present for this meeting were Ing Patrick Spiteri Staines, Chair of the Energy Efficiency and Conservation Thematic Committee, Head of Policy at The Malta Chamber Kevin Mizzi and Policy Executive Ing Stefan De Marco. The delegation met with Minister for Public Works and Planning Stefan Zrinzo Azzopardi, to discuss Pre-Budget proposals on New Builds, Renovation, Waste, Excavation and demolition, rating of building materials.
During this meeting the following subjects were raised:
• improved communication efforts between BCA and the Planning Authority with the aim of better compliance and enforcement • moving towards NetZero buildings by increasing take-up of sustainable building materials • the current state of the Building Codes, Fire Regulations and Building Passport • the vital role of contractor licensing • the need for an education and awareness campaign highlighting legal requirements, in particular those regarding energy efficiency • the importance of ensuring that BCA has the necessary skilled and specialized resources
The theme of this year’s conference reflects the challenges that the sector has gone through, and still is going through, in Malta as well as in other jurisdictions.
The 15th FinanceMalta Annual Conference entitled “Learning from the past: Looking to the Future” will be held on 1 December 2022 at the Intercontinental Arena Conference Centre. This will be the first fully in-person and face-to-face annual conference to be organised since the pandemic and is considered to be the largest local gathering for the financial services industry. The conference will feature C-level executives from Malta and abroad, European Union policymakers, Maltese Government representatives, officials of global standard-setting organisations, renowned academics, researchers and more.
The theme of this year’s conference reflects the challenges that the sector has gone through, and still is going through, in Malta as well as in other jurisdictions. These include the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the FATF grey listing and eventual white listing, the Russia-Ukraine war and the rapid increase in inflation and cost of living. FinanceMalta’s event will focus on the lessons learnt but also will take a look forward and see how, collectively, Malta can continue to seize the opportunities for growth in financial services, amidst an ever-changing economic and regulatory environment.
FinanceMalta’s Chairman George Vella said: “It feels good to host once again, in a face-to-face format, our annual conference. It will be a great opportunity to analyse what has been another unprecedented year and, most importantly, to look into the opportunities for 2023 and beyond. We will do this with a line-up of excellent speakers and we look forward to providing, once again, a platform to discuss the future of the Maltese financial services industry.”
The annual conference will feature prominent keynote speakers from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the London School of Economics (LSE) Law School and more. Malta’s Prime Minister Robert Abela and the President of the European Parliament Roberta Metsola will be addressing the conference. The event will be chaired by Deborah Webster.
The annual conference will be opened by FinanceMalta’s Chairman, and the first panel session will be titled “A look at our lessons and achievements in 2022”. Ms Webster will moderate the panel discussion, which will include Dr. Helga Buttigieg Debono, Executive Head, National Coordinating Committee on Combating Money Laundering & Funding of Terrorism (NCC), the MFSA, the Director of the FIAU Kenneth Farrugia and MBR CEO Geraldine Spiteri Lucas as panellists.
Plans for the financial services industry for 2023 and beyond will be the main theme of a live panel session moderated by the Malta Chamber Chairperson Marisa Xuereb. Panellists for this session include Malta Financial Services Advisory Council Chairman Joseph Zammit Tabona, Economist Gordon Cordina and Institute of Financial Services Practitioners President Tonio Zarb.
Banking in Malta in the context of European regulatory developments will take centre stage in a panel session that will include Fabio Axisa, Chairman of the Banking and Payments working group within the MFSAC’s Action Committee; MBA Chairman Marcel Cassar; and MFSA’s Head of Supervision David Eacott.
In the afternoon, the focus will shift on to Sustainable Finance. A fireside chat will take place which will be moderated by financial consultant Steve Ellul, with the participation of Professor Andreas Hoepner and Gabriella Borda, Co-Founder Avvena – Sustainability and Decarbonisation Advisor.
The annual conference will then discuss Good Governance. Trust in the reliability of the financial system is crucial in order to contribute to the proper functioning of the economy and good governance is a prerequisite to build such trust. This theme will be debated in a panel session facilitated by Therisa Mallia, Lead, Policy, Advisory & Training, Anti-Financial Crime Department at Bank of Valletta. She will be joined by Carmine Di Noia, Director of the OECD’s Directorate for Financial and Enterprise Affairs; FATF President for 2020-2022 Marcus Pleyer; and Manfred Galdes, Managing Partner at ARQ Malta.
The conference will also delve into the topic of Digital Revolution and Digital Finance. The adoption of the European Commission’s digital finance package which includes a digital finance strategy, legislative proposals on crypto-assets and digital resilience, as well as a renewed retail payments strategy, will be discussed during this session. A fireside chat on these themes will be led by Wayne Pisani, Chairman of the Regulated Business Subcommittee at IFSP, who will be joined by Dr Phillip Paech, Associate Professor of Law at LSE Law School as well as GTG Advocates Managing Director Ian Gauci.
The closing session of FinanceMalta’s 15th Annual Conference will delve into how the sector can attract and develop talent, upskill and reskill the workforce, as well as retain existing talent. The final panel session for the day, moderated by Talent Advisor and Headhunter Fran Moisa, will include Matthew Vella, Permanent Secretary for the Ministry for Education, Sport, Youth, Research and Innovation; Identity Malta CEO Mark Mallia; Director of the Institute of Business Management and Commerce at MCAST Andrew Galea; and the Dean of the Faculty of Economics, Management & Accountancy at the University of Malta, Emanuel Said.
A networking event for delegates and speakers will be held on the eve of the annual conference, on 30 November, at the Magazino Hall in Valletta. The annual conference of FinanceMalta also offers the possibility to companies to increase their visibility through a number of sponsorship packages. For more information on the FinanceMalta Annual Conference, sponsorship opportunities as well as to register and benefit from the early bird offers, visit https://www.fmannualconference.org/
Special considerations needed to avoid additional burdens on SMEs within value chains
On Tuesday 4th October 2022, the Malta Business Bureau (MBB) held a business session on the EU proposal for a Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD). This Directive complements several other EU Directives such as the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive and the Taxonomy Regulation that look to improve the Environment, Social and Governance responsibility of companies.
The business session was introduced by MBB President, Ms Alison Mizzi who stated, “Several companies already take steps to implement due diligence processes in line with the corporate responsibility to respect human rights and the environment. New standards can be beneficial if they can be reasonably implemented and if the legal framework is designed to incentivise positive impact instead of a culture of punishment. Homogeneity of due diligence requirements across the EU are also required to level the playing-field.”
Ms. Mizzi added, “European businesses do not operate in vacuum and are very much interlinked in the global economy. From a Maltese perspective, businesses operate from a small open island economy on the periphery of the continent with some permanent disadvantages that magnify the challenges compared to the ones experienced by businesses on the mainland. Therefore, while reiterating the openness for lifting standards and adhering to sustainability and human rights obligations, there must be the right balance between making these necessary reforms and safeguarding economic competitiveness, particularly for small and medium enterprises within global value chains, and especially during the current economic climate.”
Dr. Marthese Portelli, CEO of The Malta Chamber of Commerce, Enterprise, and Industry, shared The Malta Chamber’s views on ESG obligations from the Maltese businesses perspective. Dr. Portelli emphasised, “The success or otherwise of this directive will depend on whether the EU institutions and national governments acknowledge and take into account the actual current preparedness level of our companies. It needs to be acknowledged that businesses are trying to catch a moving train. Targets imposed need to be attainable. It is also important to ensure that compliance translates into elevated standards and steers away from meaningless reporting which leaves little scope beyond paper reporting. The success or otherwise of this Directive will depend on whether it will be a driver for growth and competitiveness or whether it will be just another law which creates unnecessary impediments and excessive unjustified costs.”
The event was addressed by Dr. Ivan Sammut, legal advisor to the Ministry of Finance who shared the Maltese Government’s views on this Directive and an update on the current negotiations in the EU Council. It was also addressed by Mr. Clint Flores, Head of ESG at Bank of Valletta, and Ms. Nadine Magro, Assistant Legal Secretary of Simonds Farsons Cisk plc, who discussed the due diligence obligations on businesses requesting finance as well as those that form part of the value chain of companies that will fall within scope of this Directive.
The Malta Business Bureau is the EU-business advisory office of The Malta Chamber and the Malta Hotels and Restaurants Association. The Malta Business Bureau is a partner of the Enterprise Europe Network.
More than 400 students took part in ‘Building a Financially Capable Generation’ course, organised by JA Malta and supported by the HSBC Malta Foundation.
The HSBC Malta Foundation has supported JA Malta’s ‘Building a Financially Capable Generation’ (BaFCG) foundational sessions aimed at improving financial literacy skills among young people. A total of 414 students, aged between 12 to 16, participated in the programme.
Experience has shown that students who do not opt for business-related subjects during their studies may end their education without acquiring the necessary financial literacy skills. For this reason, the BaFCG programme, which is a global initiative by JA Worldwide and HSBC, aims to help students acquire these skills through user-friendly material and hands-on activities which act as a catalyst for student participation. This global programme is in line with JA Malta’s objectives of empowering young people to own their financial futures. The more young people know about managing their money, including ways to earn it, how to spend it wisely, and how to save money, the more control they will have over their life, without making money the only driver.
Simon Vaughan Johnson, Chief Executive Officer of HSBC Bank Malta p.l.c, said: “Financial literacy skills are crucial life skills. The earlier people learn these skills, the more confident they become in managing their personal finances. The hands-on approach of JA Malta’s BaFCG sessions is aimed at reinforcing and strengthening students’ financial knowledge in a relaxed, fun environment.”
Matthew Caruana, Chief Executive Officer at JA Malta, said: “This project is part of JA’s ongoing commitment to improving the financial capabilities of young people. In line with our commitment to this mission, this project has enabled us to reach students and deliver engaging educational sessions in an enjoyable environment. We would like to thank HSBC and the HSBC Malta Foundation for their continued support.”
“The Board is trusting us to sustain and enhance the success of a group of companies on which the livelihood of 4,500 families and individuals depends,” says Robert Debono, newly appointed Group CEO”
The db Group’s Board of Directors has appointed four key officers to take forward its vision and oversee its execution. The move also marks a watershed in the family’s succession planning moment.
Robert Debono has been appointed as the Group’s CEO with a clear brief to continue to drive an already robust business and investment strategy and to consolidate financial success on all fronts.
Dr. David Debono, a lawyer, is the Chief Legal Officer overseeing all legal matters as well as those pertaining to HR and Alan Debono will be the Chief Procurement and Accounting Officer responsible for financial and purchasing policy and execution. Victoria Debono is now the Brands Manager in charge of nurturing and expanding the Group’s local and global brand portfolio.
Silvio Debono remains Chairman of the Board.
Robert Debono comments: “This is an exciting and humbling challenge for my siblings and myself. The Board is trusting us to sustain and enhance the success of a group of companies on which the livelihood of 4,500 families and individuals depends. It is also happening as the tourism industry and the economy are expected to get a post-pandemic reboot. The future looks bright and we are ready for it.”
Silvio Debono comments: “My wife and I gave our children the freedom to choose their individual paths in life. They took different ones which, as luck would have it, are converging at this very moment. I am convinced that they will continue to expand and deepen our Group’s vision and prudently execute it. As the Group’s chairman, I shall oversee this positive transition, ensuring that our strong financial standing is sustained and to see that our excellent track record remains extends to the future.”
db Group Performance
The db Group’s post-pandemic recovery is exceeding forecasts, with figures at March 2022 comparing well with those of March 2020, the last month before the pandemic struck. The March 2020 financial results were better than those of the year ending March 2021, the year in which the pandemic took its biggest toll. Accordingly, comparisons with the March 2020 benchmark, at the end of a record year for tourism in Malta, lead to a more balanced picture of the Group’s performance.
As it did during the financial crisis, the Group once again continued to invest even during the darkest pandemic months. Throughout, the Group maintained its position as Malta’s largest local hotel operator. New Starbucks outlets and two new restaurants, LOA and Sonora were inaugurated, the latter two after March 2022. This growth was also complemented with an extensive rebranding and modernisation programme of the hotels and their restaurants.
The strategy paid off as it did at the end of the 2009 financial crisis. It drove the uniquely fast recovery of the Group as the worst of the pandemic was put behind us. In March 2022 Group revenue stood at €40 million, just €20 million less than in March 2020. EBITDA in March 2022 stood at €24 million, just €3.5 million less in the same period.
Profit after tax in March 2022 was €10.5 million when compared to €12 million in March 2020. Capital expenditure in March 2020 was almost €8 million against a Capex of almost €5 million in 2022.
Motherwell Bridge Industries is part of HV Marine, a division of Hili Ventures
Motherwell Bridge Industries, the Malta-based engineering company, has won contracts for crane assembly and specialist team deployment at major container terminals for Finnish lifting specialist Konecranes in Scotland, Germany, Belgium, South Korea and the US.
The contracts have been awarded for the assembly and commissioning of one rubber-tyred gantry crane in Blackford in Scotland and five in Chicago. Motherwell Bridge Industries has also been entrusted with the provision of specialist technicians to assemble straddle carrier cranes in Bremerhaven in Germany, Zeebrugge in Belgium, and in Busan and Hyundai in South Korea. These projects are expected to be completed by the year’s end.
“Motherwell Bridge Industries has worked hard to build a track record for excellence over the years and we have consistently succeeded in completing projects on time and on budget wherever we have operated around the world,” Motherwell Bridge Industries Managing Director Tony Mallia said. “These latest contracts awarded by Konecranes are testament to our teams’ work ethic and professionalism.”
Motherwell Bridge Industries has been a preferred sub-contractor for Konecranes since 2005 and has assembled more than 350 cranes at key ports across all continents. Additionally it has built a long-standing relationship with the national port terminal, Malta Freeport Terminals, where a dedicated team is responsible for the maintenance and servicing of all container handling equipment.
The company’s Casablanca-based subsidiary Techniplus is entrusted with similar maintenance and servicing responsibilities at Morocco’s main ports at Casablanca, Tangiers, Agadir and Jorf Lasfar. In 2020 alone, the companies jointly assembled and commissioned 22 rubber-tyred gantry cranes at Tangiers, and are currently collaborating on other projects internationally.
Motherwell Bridge Industries is part of HV Marine, a division of Hili Ventures, the group engaged in multi-sited activities in partnership with McDonald’s and Apple, logistics, marine and engineering, technology, oil & gas, property, hospitality and leasing. Hili Ventures is present in 10 countries with a team of 10,000 people.
Aqubix, a Malta based IT company has developed their very own product “KYC Portal”, which is taking the international RegTech space by storm. In just over 5 years they have achieved great international recognition and are now an award-winning product with over 65 clients, spread across 5 continents and in a various number of different industries and jurisdictions.
On the 22nd September, KYC Portal’s Business Development Manager, Nickii Mallia attended the A-Team Group’s inaugural Data Management Insight Awards – USA 2022 drinks reception in New York. During the event, KYC Portal won the Best KYC & Client On-Boarding Solution award, alongside winners from Bloomberg, Refinitiv and Capco, to mention a few. Full list of winners can be viewed here. These awards recognise both established solution vendors and innovative newcomers providing leading data management solutions, services and consultancy to capital markets participants across North America.
The awards included 30 categories of data management solutions ranging from Best Corporate Actions Solution to Best Data Management Initiative for ESG, Best Standards Solution for Data Management, Best Data Quality Analysis Tool, Best Graph Database Solution, Best Data Science Solution, Best North America Consultancy in Data Management, and more.
“Our compliments to all the award winners, who should be deservedly proud of their achievement in a closely fought and highly competitive contest.” – A-Team Group
KYCP is the most advanced and fully dynamic, real-time, risk-driven, complete end-to-end Client Lifecycle Management solution on the market, developed specifically in order to help organisations stay compliant with all the regulatory changes, on top of competition, all whilst being in full control and risk exposure reduced to a minimum.
The onboarding module within KYC Portal is called the Customer Outreach Tool, an embedded module that is part and parcel of the product which allows external subjects to be able to on-board themselves. The importance of this module being integrated within KYC Portal is critical as the data that the system presents to the end-user is dynamically maintained by the organisation itself. Based on the data that the customer is filling in in the first step (forms) the system is in real-time calculating the risk being perceived. Which risk is dynamically changing the requirements in the next steps, which enables the subject to upload their own documents and answer any questionnaires, based on the defined enhanced due diligence process set in KYCP.
KYC Portal allows the compliance team to streamline and define within the system all that has to do with the ongoing side of KYC and due diligence alerting your teams when something needs to be addressed rather than having a team of employees who are constantly on the lookout for such happenings. Based on KYCP’s fully dynamic configuration engine, which is in the hands of your compliance teams to update and tweak accordingly, it allows you to define your review process at subject level based on risk, define the document requirements also based on the enhanced due diligence process, integrate with third-party screening services for constant daily alerts on changed risk levels of subjects and calculates risk in real-time on all data being fed.
With a system like KYC Portal, the work that is usually all done on the date of the review of the respective application is spread throughout the lifetime of the subject based on what needs to happen when.
“We are proud to have created the first fully embedded CLM solution for the due diligence function of any company in any jurisdiction. KYC Portal offers an entire lifecycle from the very first steps of on boarding a counterparty whilst also automating the full ongoing aspect of due diligence. This seamless combination delivers a lot of benefit to our customers since it allows them to be in full control of both sides of the journey leading to a lifecycle that is tailored on the process requirements but also a system that adapts the journey based on the real time data that is being input at that stage of the lifecycle.” Kristoff Zammit Ciantar, KYC Portal Founder & CEO
Aqubix is an IT consultancy and experienced solution provider with one clear objective; they aim to deliver the best customer service and have earned a reputation for offering a flexible approach with years of experience in business analysis and technical architecture. Aqubix have taken a number of innovative products to market; however, their flagship product is KYC Portal (KYCP). Head quartered in Malta and a sister company in London (UK), the company is today part of Mizzi Organisation, one of Malta’s largest leading group of companies who acquired 50% at the beginning of 2016 as part of our growth strategy.
GABRIEL CASSAR – Senior Policy Executive – Sustainable Development
The European Union is a global leader in setting ambitious targets to improve the sustainability of its member states and influencing third countries to do the same. Recently, the European Commission has placed its focus on the way we manufacture, use, recycle and dispose of products by publishing the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products regulation (ESPR), which aims to improve circularity of products marketed in the EU.
This is seen as one of several important measures towards achieving the goals set out in the EU Green Deal, namely, to increase sustainability and make Europe the first climate neutral continent by 2050. The proposal will introduce new ecodesign and information requirements which products will have to meet to be placed on the EU market. The latter will include, for instance, information on product performance, repair, recycling and dismantling, handling, among others. All this information will be collected in one common data carrier, called the Digital Product Passport (DPP).
The Malta Business Bureau in principle sees the proposal as a way to further streamline the value chain and improve the sustainability of products, reducing waste where possible through an information-driven approach. Information gaps are some of the main challenges which inhibit circularity truly being applied to the way we manufacture, use, repurpose and dispose of products. This regulation thus represents a key opportunity to develop new circular markets for our products.
Implementing this in the form of a regulation will also help improve the functioning of the EU single market by setting the exact same requirements across all member states. This in turn provides increased legal certainty, lower costs, and a level playing field for businesses seeking to market their products in the EU. Despite the positives, the ESPR proposal has raised several key concerns which must be considered seriously by EU and National policymakers. The first, and perhaps the most obvious, is that the new requirements will undoubtedly introduce additional financial and administrative costs for businesses in a time where they are already contending with supply-side issues and rising input prices. The proposal mentions that SMEs will be supported through financial schemes and written guidelines to ease the transition. This part will be crucial to support a section of businesses with limited resources and which will be hardest hit by the legislation.
More generally, policymakers need to be cautious of overburdening businesses with multiple pieces of legislations which overlap and introduce similar requirements. There are currently several pieces of EU legislation adopted, or still being discussed, which introduce similar environmental or information requirements. Clear examples are the Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive, the REACH Directive on chemicals, and the Empowering Consumers for the Green Transition Directive. All these separate initiatives must be efficiently streamlined to avoid double-regulation and ever mounting administrative costs for businesses.
Aside from the related costs, requiring businesses to disclose certain information on their products will introduce competitiveness concerns over access to confidential data and trade secrets. The proposal does not adequately delineate which type of information will be available to what actor along the value chain, leaving the possibility that actors will have access to information which they do not need.
Finally, the successful implementation of the ESPR will require a huge, coordinated effort between various actors across the supply chain. The most precarious of these relationships will be between EU businesses and non-EU suppliers, with the former relying on the latter to supply accurate and timely information on the materials being used. It may often prove difficult to gather all information from the non-EU suppliers. Legal safeguards consequently should be introduced to ensure EU businesses do not ultimately pay the punitive price for their non-EU suppliers’ shortcomings.
While the ESPR will be a complex and challenging policy to implement, it certainly is a welcome initiative if formulated with the appropriate caution. In this regard, the setting up of a consultative Ecodesign Forum involving affected industry players, to help formulate ecodesign requirements is a positive development which will ensure the business voice is heard and accounted for.
On its part, the MBB is following the ESPR negotiations at EU level within the European Parliament and Council of the EU. We encourage businesses with an active interest in this area to get in touch with our policy team for more information or with any feedback or concerns.
Gabriel Cassar is a Senior Policy Executive for Sustainable Development at the Malta Business Bureau. The MBB is the EU advisory organisation of the Malta Chamber and the Malta Hotels and Restaurants Association, and a partner of the Enterprise Europe Network.
The Malta Chamber of Commerce, Enterprise and Industry provided its feedback to PWC Malta in relation to a study carried out by them on real estate transparency in Malta.
The Malta Chamber believes that transparency in business is crucial because it creates trust and a positive reputation. Similarly, the PWC Malta report outlines how transparency in the real estate market ensures consistency and certainty. One of the things highlighted in the report focuses on the need for better enforcement of regulations. The survey also highlights the underlying demand drivers for the industry and the current status of the real estate’s environmental sustainability credentials.
During the consultation period, The Malta Chamber outlined its various proposals on how the real estate industry can grow in a sustainable manner.
