Malta Financial Services Authority provides new proposed regime

Malta Financial Services Authority – Notified Professional Investor Funds (“NPIR”)

The key points from the new proposed regime include the following:

• Similar to another regime – the Notified AIF – the NPIF is only subject to a notification process and hence will not be licenced by the MFSA. Subject to receiving the relevant documents in line with the proposed rulebook, the NPIF will be included in the list of Notified NPIFs within 10 days
• NPIFs cannot be set-up as ‘self-managed’ structures and as third party-managed funds would need to be managed by: 

1. 1. A locally licenced de minimis AIFM
   2. EU de minimis AIFM which has been authorised in an EU or EEA State and which the Authority deems to be subject to regulation in an equal or comparable level to that which it would have been subject to in Malta
   3. Third country AIFMs which are authorised in a jurisdiction with whom the MFSA has signed a cooperation agreement and which the Authority deems to be subject to regulation in an equal or comparable level to that it would have been subject to in Malta

• NPIFs may only be made available to ‘Qualifying Investors’
• Marketing material will not be subject to a regulatory review by the MFSA
• Initial and ongoing due diligence with respect to the NPIF may be undertaken by an approved ‘Service Provider’
• NPIFs would be able to engage in any investment strategy except for lending activity

The above may be subject to change following feedback sent to the Authority by the industry.

In the meantime, further information with respect to the proposed regime may be found here.

Alternatively, please feel free to reach out to us.