Management of the Agency

Miloš Čas took up the position of the Director and Chairman of the Securities Market Agency on May 4, 2015 after he was appointed by National Assembly of the Republic of Slovenia on March 31, 2015.

Mr. Čas studied at University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Law, and obtained Master's in civil and business law. He passed Bar exam.

At the beginning of his career he was involved primarily with the project of setting up the operations of the Ljubljana Stock Exchange (LJSE). From 1989 to 2006 he worked at the LJSE as Director of Legal Department and acted as a proxy of the LJSE. From 1994 to 1996 he worked as a researcher at the University of Ljubljana, Faculty of Law, at the Chair of civil and business law. From 2002 to 2006 he was a member of the Council of the Insurance Supervision Agency of the Republic of Slovenia.

From 2006 to 2012 he was a member of the Management Board of Triglav Assets Management Company. Miloš Čas participated in several working groups for the preparation of systemic (financial) legislation, in the various expert groups in the field of privatization, capital markets and finance. He was a member of supervisory boards of companies in Slovenia and abroad,as well as a member and president of examination boards to obtain a broker licence at the Securities Market Agency. Among other positions he also served as a a member of a Regulatory Committee of the Federation of the European Exchanges (FESE).

From 2012 until his appointment as Director and Chairman of the Securities Market Agency he worked as advisor to the Management Board of Triglav Assets Management Company.

As Director of the Securities Market Agency he is a member of the ESMA’s Board of Supervisors, and a member of IOSCO’s Committees.

Primož Damjanovič graduated in 2000 from the Faculty of Economics in Ljubljana.

After graduation he started working at the Ministry of Finance in the Financial System Department. Since 2003 he has been working at the Securities Market Agency (SMA), where he initially as a consultant and then as an adviser to the director performed the most demanding individual tasks in the field of regulation of investment and pension funds. In 2008 he took over management of the Funds Department, which is responsible for regulating investment and mutual pension funds. During the service at the Agency he led numerous projects, among others the introduction of ETF funds, umbrella funds with sub-funds, the introduction of alternative investment funds, the renovation of the investment fund’s reporting system and its integration with the Bank of Slovenia, the development and introduction of user-friendly applications of e-legislation, the introduction of umbrella pension funds of life-cycle investment strategy. He is a member of the Investment Management Standing Committee, which operates within the framework of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), President of the Examination Committee in the field of marketing of investment funds and technical editor for the English language.

Primož Damjanovič is a member of the Council of the Securities Market Agency and the Council of Experts of the Insurance Supervision Agency .

Since November 2015 he is the Deputy Director and Head of Funds Department.

Primož Pinoza graduated at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science in 1994.

In 1998, he obtained a Master’s degree at the Faculty of Economics in Ljubljana.

Primož Pinoza gained experience in the field of capital markets as a member and president of the Management Board of a brokerage company and advisor to the Securities Market Agency. As the Head of Financial Instruments Market Department he performs the most demanding tasks related to the implementation of supervision over the operations of the supervised entities and over the issuing of licenses or approvals in accordance with the provisions of the ZTFI and other laws related to the financial services market.

Primož Pinoza is a member of the ESMA's Secondary Markets Standing Committee and the ATVP's representative at the ESRB.

Primož Pinoza speaks English, Serbian and Croatian.

Marko Vozelj graduated in 1989 at the Faculty of Law in Ljubljana. He passed the bar exam in 1992.

In 1989, he was employed as apprentice at the High Court of Ljubljana. After passing the bar examination in 1992, he continued his career as a legal advisor in the company SKB Nepremičnine & Leasing d. o. o., Ljubljana. In 1989, he was employed as apprentice at the High Court of Ljubljana. After passing the bar examination in 1992, he continued his career as a legal advisor in the company SKB Nepremičnine & Leasing d. o. o., Ljubljana. In 2003, he started to work at the Securities Market Agency, where he assumed the role as a deputy director and head of the Legal Department from 2008 to 2017, and from 2018 to 2019 he became the head of the Legal and General Affairs Department. From 2020 he runs the Financial and General Affairs Department, which performs general tasks relating to the operation of the ATVP, such as tasks in the field of finance and accounting, human resources, procurement and other general works and tasks necessary for the smooth operation of the ATVP.

Marko Vozelj speaks English, Serbian and Croatian.

Sabina Bešter graduated in June 1991 at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Ljubljana, where she also obtained Master's degree in March 1999.

After graduation, she started her career at Nova Ljubljanska banka d.d. (NLB Velenje) in Treasury Department. She has been employed by the Securities Market Agency since its establishment in September 1993. During that time she performed the tasks in the area of primary securities market, notably approval of the prospectuses for public offerings of securities, supervision of public companies’ reporting requirements, approval of takeovers and supervision of those activities. The other area of activities has been international cooperation. She has actively led the Agency's activities for the membership in IOSCO (International Organization of Securities Commissions) as well as the procedures for the admission of Slovenia to the EU, later on in the OECD in the areas of the Agency’s competences and responsibilities.

In 2000 she was appointed the Head of International Cooperation Department, where she cooperates actively with other securities market supervisory authorities within the EU and other countries, international organizations (IMF, World Bank, etc.) and other institutions. Since 2003 she is an active member of various working groups and committees as well as the contact person for Slovenia in the CESR (Committee of European Securities Regulators). After foundation of ESMA (European Securities and Markets Authority) as an EU Authority in January 2011 in addition to the above tasks she also represents the Securities Market Agency as an alternate member of the ESMA Board of Supervisors.

Since January 2019 she is the Deputy Director and Head of International Cooperation Department.

Sabina Bešter speaks English.

Nikolina Prah graduated in 2002 at the Faculty of Law in Ljubljana. She passed the bar exam in 2004.

After graduating, she was employed at Pivovarna Union d.d., in 2004 she continued her professional career at the District Court Ljubljana. She is employed at the Agency since 2006. As a senior legal advisor she performs the most complex legal tasks and represents the Agency in administrative, judicial and offenses procedures. Nikolina is a member of the Legal network and the Takeover Panel at the ESMA.

Since January 1, 2018 Nikolina Prah is the Head of Legal Affairs. From January 2020, she was also appointed Secretary of the ATVP's Council.

Nikolina Prah speaks English and Croatian.

Tanja Lovka graduated in 1999 at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Ljubljana, where she also obtained Master's Degree in Economics in 2009.

In 1994 she was employed by Koto d.d., Ljubljana where she completed internship. Since 1995 she has been working at the ATVP. The area of her work has been constantly connected to the securities market, public companies reports, market abuse and takeovers. In these areas her tasks included examination of the requirements for the issuance of various licenses, she also supervised procedures related to the above mentioned areas, she participated at the legislation amendments pertaining to the before mentioned areas.

In 2017 she was appointed as a member of the Settlement board for the review of the conversion rate as defined in the second paragraph of Article 609 of the Companies Act, on March 28, 2019 she was appointed as a member of the Council of the Government of Republic of Slovenia for corporate governance and on January 8, 2021 she was appointed as a member the Council of the Agency for Public Oversight of Auditing. She is also a member of the Corporate Finance Standing Committee and the Expert Group on takeovers (Takeover Panel), which work within the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA).

As of 1 January 2018 Tanja Lovka is Head of the Capital Market and Takeovers Division.

Tanja Lovka speaks English.

Gregor Nastran graduated in 1999 at the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics in Ljubljana.

After graduating, he was employed at Hermes Softlab (now Comtrade) where he performed tasks of programmer and project manager until 2002. From 2002 to 2005 he worked in the following firms, at Adacta as project manager, at Oria Computers as head of development, at Ixtlan as head of marketing for BPM product and at MikroCop as programmer. In 2005 he founded his own company.

Since 2010 he has been working at the ATVP at the IT department. In December 2015 he became head of IT department. Gregor has been in charge of numerous IT projects at the ATVP, including the introduction of the ISO/IEC 27001:2013 certificate, data warehouse, virtualization of workstations and servers, renewal of the reporting system, documentation system and data exchange with other Slovenian and European regulators.

Gregor is a member of the ESMA IT Management and Governance Technical Committee.

Gregor speaks English.