into force on Tuesday, the exchange revealed last night.

The international listing regulations, which were released yesterday, have been approved by the Bermuda Monetary Authority pursuant to section 12 of the Bermuda Stock Exchange Company Act, the exchange said.

"The regulations facilitate the listing of new international products and are an important part of the expansion plans for the BSE,'' said BSE chief executive officer Mr. William Woods in a statement.

"They lay the foundation upon which the BSE hopes to develop the world's first truly offshore, international securities market.

"These new international regulations have opened the BSE up to many new and exciting international products.

"Our initial focus is on attracting secondary listings for companies which are domiciled here and have a primary listing on another recognised exchange and on attracting more mutual funds to list here.

"The regulations also facilitate the listing of Eurobonds and start up companies which restrict their securities to professional investors only.'' Existing international issues listed on the exchange have been grandfathered under the new regulations.

At this stage, the BSE is not able to provide a primary listing for international issuers, the exchange said.

To facilitate global equity issues, the regulations provide that international companies that restrict issue and trading of their securities to "qualified investors'' may list on the exchange.

"This ability to list issues which are limited to qualified investors is an exciting opportunity, especially for start up and specialist companies, which may not be ready to make an initial public offering (IPO) to retail investors,'' the exchange said.

Simultaneous to the release of the new international listing rules, the exchange, owned by the Island's three banks, will release a revised set of domestic draft listing rules.

The public consultation period on the revised draft extends until close of business on Friday, December 1.

The domestic regulations will apply to Bermudian-owned companies and Bermuda dollar denominated funds and bonds.

The exchange is inviting comments on the revised domestic draft rules and is hoping to complete the domestic rules by year's end.

Island companies will be afforded a grace period to comply.

As well as new international rules and revised draft domestic rules, the 22-year-old exchange recently added new staff, launched a new settlement system and added three new Island firms trading partner privileges.

The new trading firms have a future option to collectively own 15 percent of the exchange.

That percentage may in the future be expanded.

There are currently 46 companies, 57 funds and six debt issues listed on the exchange.

Total market capitalisation of all listed companies at June 30 was $1.1 billion.