No less than 600 amendments have been tabled by MEPs concerning the revision of alternative investment fund rules (AIFM). On Wednesday 31 August, they were able to exchange views in the Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs (ECON), with the European Commission trying to explain its choices.
For the text’s rapporteur, Isabel Benjumea (EPP, Spanish), “the key thing is to have the political will to provide an impetus to move towards a more competitive European market”.
In her opinion, this impetus is organised around 4 measures: - mobilising more capital; - allowing better access to the market for investors; - enabling portfolio diversification; - attracting more competitive foreign capital.
This can be achieved, she said, through having the clearest possible supervisory regulatory framework, improved delegation practices and a stronger role for the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA).
“I think our proposal was meant to increase the transparency on how delegation arrangements are structured in Europe and in order to assess the potential risks stemming from this delegation arrangements to avoid the development of letterbox entities and to foster confidence and cooperation within the EU”, justified the European Commission representative.
“In the EU, we therefore consider reporting on delegation as absolutely key and we consider that it should cover a sufficiently wide sets of data to be representative and meaningful for ESMA and national surveillance authorities to be able to monitor the activities of funds in Europe”, she added.
For Billy Kelleher (Renew Europe, Irish), “there should be no distinction made between intra EU and third country delegation”. Eugen Jurzyca (ECR, Slovakian) does not share this opinion.
Like other MEPs, Ms Benjumea felt that the criteria set by the European Commission to regulate fund managers were not strict enough.
“We want to stop investor being charged undue costs by fund managers and lack of standards means that return investors pay on average 40% More than institutional or professional investors”, said Paul Tang (S&D, Dutch).
Ms Benjumea noted that these funds represent 1.5 billion euros in Europe and is of the opinion that it is “a sector with high growth potential”. She has set herself the goal of reaching a compromise text by mid-October. “We will try to find a balance between investor security and return, and to find a common position on cost, rate of return, depository passports and sustainability criteria”, she concluded.
The EU Council, for its part, has already determined its negotiating position (see EUROPE 12974/24).
To read MEPs’ amendments: https://aeur.eu/f/2vs and https://aeur.eu/f/2vt (Original version in French by Anne Damiani)