Relaxation Of Us Regulatory Requirements For European Hedge Fund Managers

Overview: In the role as counsel to various European hedge fund promoters, one issue one often comes across is the reluctance of a significant number of European promoted hedge funds to accept US investors into their funds for fear of subjecting themselves to US regulation, reporting and compliance. Among the issues of concern are registration obligations with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and/or the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), US tax accounting and reporting, and compliance with US laws governing investment by pension funds (commonly referred to by its acronym ERISA). Combined with a lack of understanding of how properly to access the market, it is perhaps easy to see why some promoters are wary. The article asserts that the SEC is soon to conclude its formal fact-finding investigation into the operations and practices of hedge funds and may introduce changes to the current regulatory regime. Particularly in light of the ongoing SEC investigation, some industry participants are greeting the CFTC’s deregulatory initiative with surprise. In any event, the new exemptions adopted by the CFTC provide new opportunities for European fund managers to more easily access the largest investor market in the world.

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Format: PDF | Size: 153KB | Date: Aug 2003 | Pages: 4