Some non-EU managers are struggling to meet updated private placement rules in the Netherlands that require them to provide attestation from their home state regulator that they are locally supervised, legal sources said.
“It's a problem because a number of funds [in certain countries] do not even need to be authorized,” said Glynn Barwick, counsel for law firm Goodwin Procter.
“Take for instance Canada. Canadian managers don’t need to be authorized in all circumstances, so technically speaking Canadian funds cannot market into the Netherlands, full stop,” he said.
US managers originally encountered a similar difficulty requesting this attestation from the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) but pfm understands that the US regulator now provides a uniform certification note for any SEC-registered manager who requests it.
“Eventually the [SEC] got swamped by so many managers asking for these attestations they compromised,” according to one industry funds lawyer. “The SEC basically said to the Dutch, take this as a general attestation and go and look up on our website whether they are authorized.”
The SEC was not immediately able to return a request for comment.