South Africa’s financial watchdog launches market abuse investigation

• The Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) has launched a market abuse investigation into alleged manipulation of contracts for difference (CFD) trade in South Africa.
• The investigation targets a tactic where traders artificially shift share prices to profit from highly leveraged bets on CFDs, a practice that has been identified in other major jurisdictions including the UK.
• The FSCA will use suspicious trading information from the Johannesburg Stock Exchange to determine the identities and motives of the traders involved and to determine whether the trades are consolidated among select groups.