Nomu’s investor base has just broadened to include bachelor’s graduates in finance, investment, and accounting under newly approved rules that update and expand a draft framework (pdf) floated by the Capital Market Authority (CMA) in March. The changes — effective immediately — widen the range of individuals eligible to trade on the parallel market, easing long-standing entry barriers as regulators look to bolster liquidity and revive a market that has lagged this year.

What’s changed: Only those with a master’s degree or specialized professional credentials, such as the SOCPA fellowship, were qualified to trade on Nomu before the new amendments. The revised criteria open the door to younger, early-career practitioners who were previously excluded.

ALSO- A lighter trading load: The threshold for individuals qualifying through trading activity was cut to SAR 20 mn in total trades over the past 12 months, compared with the earlier requirement of SAR 40 mn spread across at least 10 trades each quarter, scrapping the quarterly minimum facilities entry for investors who trade in larger but less frequent blocks.

  • Together, the lower threshold and simpler calculation are designed to give the market a larger, steadier flow of active participants, which has a direct impact on liquidity.

AND- BoDs get a free pass: Board members and board-committee members of Nomu-listed companies are now automatically qualified for investing in the parallel market, a status they previously held only if they met the broader, stricter qualified-investor criteria.

The new Nomu-only label: The framework also swaps out the generic “qualified investor” label for the Nomu-specific “qualified investor in the parallel market.” The change tightens compliance and removes ambiguity that previously blurred the line between Nomu eligibility and the broader qualified investor.

IN CONTEXT- The parallel market is facing a slump, as NomuC delivered YTD losses of 22.5% (as of Thursday). The cooling was clear in 3Q, where the index held flat near 25.5k points as total value traded dropped to SAR 2.05 bn from SAR 2.98 bn in 3Q 2024. The index’s average turnover also slid to SAR 31.5 mn during the quarter, down from SAR 45.9 mn in the same period last year.

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