On January 2, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) published its annual regulatory and examination priorities letter. The letter identifies and sets forth how FINRA intends to address significant risks and issues that could adversely affect investors and market integrity in 2014. FINRA addresses four categories of priorities in its letter, and a number of sub-issues in each category: (1) Business Conduct Priorities, (2) Fraud Priorities, (3) Financial and Operational Priorities, and (4) Market Regulation Priorities. This client alert summarizes...

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The Trepp CMBS delinquency rate continued to drop in December, with a rate decrease of 23 basis points. December marks the seventh straight month of improvement in the rate. The delinquency rate for US commercial real estate loans in CMBS is now 7.43%. The delinquency rate ended the year 228 basis points better than where it was at the end of 2012. Since reaching a peak level of 10.34% in 2012, the Trepp delinquency rate has dropped 291 basis points....

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December liquidation volume and loss severity stayed fairly close to November’s levels, which were a rebound from two months of below average activity. Liquidation volume registered $1.28 billion in December, up slightly from $1.21 billion in November and in line with the 12-month moving average of $1.18 billion. Of the loans liquidated, 90% fell into the greater than 2% loss severity category. December loss severity came in at 50.36%, up from November’s 48.10% and considerably higher than October's 38.58%. The...

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On 18 December 2013, the Irish Funds Industry Association (the “IFIA”) released Investment Funds Sectoral Guidelines on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purpose of money laundering and terrorist financing (the “Sectoral Guidelines”). The release of the Sectoral Guidelines follows extensive engagement between the IFIA and the Central Bank of Ireland (the “Central Bank”) in order to develop a standard that the Central Bank can use in determining that an investment fund has adequate measures...

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With recent changes in international tax planning and the need to look further afield when deciding the most suitable jurisdiction for structuring purposes, the UK has positioned itself as an important centre to consider. In addition to having a good international reputation, political stability and being a member of the EU, the UK can offer the following potential advantages: • A wide tax treaty network - over 100 double taxation treaties. • The tax treaty network enables dividends from many countries...

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