The Board of Directors of the Capital Market Authority has approved amending the capital market legislations and licensing crowdfunding platforms in the Sultanate which are innovative financing instruments and financial techs enabling entrepreneurs, micro, small and medium enterprises to get more appropriate financing mechanisms.

The Board emphasized the importance of launching such type of financing products for their significance as financing options for small and medium enterprises in the Sultanate to enhance economic development, creations of jobs and financial inclusion.

CMA’s endeavors to launch and  regulate crowdfunding platforms in Oman comes from the wise government’s efforts to provide financing facilities for small and medium enterprises and micro projects, encouraging youth initiatives and overcoming one of the key challenges facing the  projects such as the banking sector’s reluctance to fund such projects due to the related risks and lack of proper guarantees to  convince the banks to grant funding facilities beside the impact of the global financial crisis and the  COVID- 19 pandemic on the banking sector and the liquidity crunch.

It is worth to note that crowdfunding platforms regulations are in their final stages of preparation and the CMA will take into consideration, in setting out the rules, that they will not be transformed into lending institutions in the conventional sense and will post them for consultation and feedback from the public. CMA intends to license the first crowdfunding platform in Oman before the end of this year.