finance Finance refers to monetary resources and to the study and Academic discipline, discipline of money, currency, assets and Liability (financial accounting), liabilities. As a subject of study, is a field of Business administration, Business Admin ...

and

financial law Financial law is the law and regulation of the commercial banking, capital markets, insurance, derivatives and investment management sectors. Understanding financial law is crucial to appreciating the creation and formation of banking and finan ...

, dematerialization refers to the substitution of paper-form

securities A security is a tradable financial asset. The term commonly refers to any form of financial instrument, but its legal definition varies by jurisdiction. In some countries and languages people commonly use the term "security" to refer to any for ...

by book-entry securities. This is a form of indirect holding system in which an intermediary, such as a broker or central securities depository, or the issuer (e.g., French system) holds a record of the ownership of shares usually in electronic format. The dematerialization of securities such as stocks has been a major trend since the late 1960s, with the result that by 2010 the majority of global securities were held in dematerialized form electronically.

History

Although the phenomenon is ancient, since book-entry systems for recording securities have been noted from civilisations as early as

Assyria Assyria (Neo-Assyrian cuneiform: , ''māt Aššur'') was a major ancient Mesopotamian civilization that existed as a city-state from the 21st century BC to the 14th century BC and eventually expanded into an empire from the 14th century BC t ...

in 2000 BC, it gained new prominence with the advent of computer technology in the late 20th century. Even during the period when paper certificates were popular, book-entry systems continued since many small firms could not afford printing secured paper-form securities. These book-entry securities were often held under the control of an attorney who acts as a

notary A notary is a person authorised to perform acts in legal affairs, in particular witnessing signatures on documents. The form that the notarial profession takes varies with local legal systems. A notary, while a legal professional, is distin ...

to certify the existence of the securities, as well as their authenticity. Since the 1960s, dematerialization has affected more and more listed companies in the United States and more recently in

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational union, supranational political union, political and economic union of Member state of the European Union, member states that are Geography of the European Union, located primarily in Europe. The u ...

, where dematerialized securities represent often more than 99% of the securities listed on regulated markets. However, the phenomenon of dematerialization of

issued by large firms is mostly undertaken via a Central Securities Depository, a national or regional institution holding the notary function, such as the

Depository Trust Company Depository Trust Company (DTC), founded in 1973, is a New York City, New York corporation that performs the functions of a central securities depository as part of the US National Market System. DTC annually settles transactions worth hundreds ...

(DTC) in the United States or Euroclear Group in the EU, which itself entrusts banks and investment firms to act as intermediaries between issuers and investors for the custody of these securities. Therefore, dematerialized securities are often referred as intermediated securities, in particular by the Unidroit convention on substantive rules for intermediated securities.

References

{{reflist Corporate law Legal documents Securities (finance) Stock market Dematerialisation (securities)

History

See also

References