The financial services industry can debate the best strategy to deliver regulation, but no one debates the need for regulation. Credible markets require credible oversight.

So, the question is: how well are Canadian regulators delivering on that proposition? Canadian investment dealers and mutual fund dealers all recognize the importance of a well-regulated marketplace. But how do they rate the performance of the regulators that police their marketplace? In the dealers’ view, how good are Canada’s regulators?

With input from dealers, former regulators and compliance professionals, Investment Executive developed a questionnaire, then asked the member firms of the Mutual Fund Dealers Association of Canada and the Investment Industry Regulatory Organization of Canada to rate their self-regulatory organizations and their primary provincial securities commission in each of the 15 categories. A “10” indicates a job well done, in the dealer’s eyes; a “1” indicates the dealers’ displeasure.

In all, IE researchers Kate Betts-Wilmott, Aedan Fowley and Olivia Glauberzon talked to almost 100 dealers across the country. They asked executives from dealers — generally, chief compliance officers — to rate regulators in terms of evenhandedness, fairness, transparency and value for the fees. Their scores indicate an appreciation of the challenges of the regulators’ role but also a desire for greater input in the process that shapes the world in which the dealers do business.

The result is IE‘s first Regulators’ Report Card. It starts on page 19. IE