Financial Services Alert - Compliments of EACC New York Founding Member Pepper Hamilton LLP On December 12, 2012, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia released its decision in Investment Company Institute v. U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission rebuffing the Investment Company Institute (ICI)'s and U.S. Chamber of Commerce (Chamber)'s efforts to overturn recently adopted Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) amendments to CFTC Rules 4.5 (exclusion from definition of commodity pool operator) (CPO) and 4.27 (CPO and CTA reporting...

Read more

The European Securities and Markets Authority (“ESMA”) has published its Final Report on Guidelines on repurchase and reverse repurchase agreements (the “Final Guidelines”) for UCITS. The Final Report which includes a Feedback Statement, contains an annex detailing the Final Guidelines. The main aim of the Final Guidelines is the protection of investors through the introduction of requirements on using repurchase and reverse repurchase agreements. The main features of the Final Guidelines are as follows: A UCITS that enters into a repurchase agreement...

Read more

A Cooperation Agreement has been approved between the European Securities and Markets Authority (“ESMA”) and the Swiss Financial Market Supervisory Authority (“FINMA”). ESMA negotiated this on behalf of all 27 European Union (“EU”) authorities for securities markets regulation in order to fulfil the pre-condition under the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive (“AIFMD”) to provide for third party access to EU markets and to allow for fund management delegation. The main aspects of the Cooperation Agreement are: the supervision by the EU and...

Read more

The Central Bank of Ireland (the “Central Bank”) issued a “Dear CEO” letter to credit and financial institutions (together the “Firms”) in relation to compliance with the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) Act 2010 (“CJA 2010”). This follows inspections carried out by the Central Bank to monitor anti-money laundering (“AML”) compliance by Irish firms (including investment funds and their service providers). The letter gives an overview of potential control weaknesses and failures identified during the Central Bank’s inspections. Additionally,...

Read more

The Irish Minister for Finance has announced in his Budget speech of December 5th 2012 that new legislation to provide for Real Estate Investment Trusts (“REITs”) will be enacted in Ireland shortly. The Minister stated: “In order to attract new investment, I will provide for the establishment of Real Estate Investment Trusts, which allow for investors to finance property investment in a risk diversified manner.” It can be noted that Ireland, unlike the US, Germany and the UK, has not had a...

Read more

Irish Finance Minister, Michael Noonan, has confirmed that negotiations with the US in relation to a new inter-governmental agreement ("IGA") have now been concluded, and as a result Ireland will be one of the first jurisdictions to enter into a new IGA with the US to implement the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (“FATCA”). These bilateral agreements will aid the US in tackling tax evasion and improving international tax compliance. It is anticipated that, under the Ireland-US IGA, Irish financial institutions will be able...

Read more

Finance Ministers of the European Union reached an important agreement on a single supervisory mechanism for the oversight of credit institutions. "I warmly welcome this exceptionally important agreement on the Single Supervisory Mechanism reached by the Council," said European Commission President José Manuel Barroso, noting that "this is a crucial and very substantive step towards completion of the banking union and a timely step forward in the integration of financial supervision for the euro area and for the other Member...

Read more

German Investment in the United States at $213 Billion - 570,000 Jobs Supported by German Firms - Germany is 6th largest U.S. Export Market Foreign investors from Germany – the largest European Economy – have long maintained a strong presence in the United States. German investment is highly sought after by state and local governments across the United States as it stands for efficient technologies, a high net value added and well-paid jobs. About 3,500 German majority-owned business operations are present...

Read more

On 11 December 2012 the European Parliament voted positively in a first reading on the EU Council's compromise proposals for two draft EU regulations on a unitary patent for Europe. The first draft regulation concerns unitary patent protection, and the second sets out the translation arrangements for such protection. The draft regulations were accepted under the EU's legislative procedure of "enhanced co-operation": With the exception of Italy and Spain, 25 EU member states have embarked on enhanced co-operation with...

Read more