Regulatory notices
On 29 March 2021, the ESMA updated its Q&A on MiFID II and MiFIR investor protection and intermediaries’ topics by added a question related to the inducements.
The question (p. 111) relates to the level of proportional inducement received justified by the provision of an additional or higher-level service quality to the relevant clients.
Recently, the Joint Committee of the European Supervisory Authorities published a consultation paper on the Taxonomy-related sustainability disclosures amending the draft regulatory technical standards about the content and presentation of sustainability disclosures pursuant to Article 8(4), 9(6) and 11(5) of Regulation (EU) 2019/2088 recently submitted to the European Commission.
Yesterday, ESMA published its result of its Common Supervisory Action led in the second half of 2020 within 30 countries in Europe.
The objective of this CSA was to assess whether UCITS managers comply with their liquidity management obligations and for NCA to collect and exchange knowledge and get experience between them. In conclusion of this exercise, ESMA will carry out further work to promote convergence in the way NCAs follow-up on the supervisory findings made during the CSA. CSA themselves will undertake follow-up actions on individual cases to ensure that regulatory breaches as well as weaknesses identified are remedied.
Yesterday, the CSSF has published a new Excel form to be included within the approval process of a new UCI (or a new subfund). This form collects information on the performance fee model and its components. This new survey is linked with the CSSF compliance with the ESMA Guidelines on performance fees in UCITS and certain types of AIFs applicable since January 5, 2021.
The French securities market watchdog “Autorité des Marchés Financiers” (AMF) has recently amended its policy on fund performance fees in connection with the ESMA guidelines on performance fees that are applicable since 5 January 2021.
On that date, the AMF announced the modification of several policies in accordance with its declaration of compliance to the ESMA guidelines on this topic. Consequently, the Instruction AMF DOC-2011-19, DOC-2011-20 and Position-Recommandation DOC-011-24 have been updated and released on 16 March 2021.
Friday 13 March 2021, the CSSF published on its website a communication on the Sustainable Finance Disclosures Regulation (SFDR) that entered in application on 10 March 2021.
As you know, this regulation applies without its level 2, which should enter into force on 1 January 2022 as proposed by the ESAs in their final report on the draft RTS.
Yesterday 9 March 2021, the Belgian Financial markets watchdog published a communication on the application of SFDR in Belgium.
This communication is available in French and Dutch only and destinated to the Belgian domiciled funds. However, the point 4.6 of this communication relates to the SFDR article 13 about marketing communication in relation to Art. 8 and Art. 9 products regardless their domicile.
Earlier this year in January, ESMA announced the launch of a Common Supervisory Action (CSA) on the supervision of costs and fees of UCITS. Friday, the CSSF communicated that it will launch the first phase of this CSA beginning of March 2021 by asking a sample of Luxembourg-based UCITS managers to complete a dedicated questionnaire for all UCITS managed, i.e. Luxembourg domiciled UCITS and foreign domiciled UCITS where applicable.
On 26 February 2021, the Directive (EU) 2021/338 of 16 February 2021 amending Directive 2014/65/EU as regards information requirements, product governance and position limits, and Directives 2013/36/EU and (EU) 2019/878 as regards their application to investment firms, to help the recovery from the COVID-19 crisis has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union.