UCITS IV EN

Introduction

Since the first UCITS directive in 1985, European management companies have broadly used UCITS, whose brand is recognised worldwide. Still, the initial goal of an integrated pan-European fund distribution model has not been fully achieved yet, as mentionned in our “Cross-border distribution of UCITS” publication issued in November 2008.The UCITS IV directive, adopted by the Council of the European Union on 22/06/2009 and whose implementation is expected by mid-2011, aims at improving the single market’s efficiency by reinforcing the asset management industry’s competitiveness and by improving fund distribution, whilst maintaining the level of protection granted to investors. CACEIS closely follows this regulatory development, as well as the other structuring evolutions for the European fund industry: depositary function harmonisation and the proposed AIFM directive on alternative investment fund managers. This document has a dual objective: to remind the readers of the background, the time-line, the challenges and the key measures of the UCITS IV directive, and to inform our clients about the CACEIS services in order to support them in this new context. We hope that this information will help our clients to better understand one of the major developments within the fund industry in Europe and facilitate the evaluation of business opportunities.

1 Background, time-line and challenges of the UCITS IV directive > From UCITS I to UCITS IV > Time-line for the implementation of UCITS IV > Challenges 2 Key measures of the directive > Simplification and reduction of the timing of the cross-border notification procedure > Replacing the simplified prospectus by the KII > Management company passport > Cross-border UCITS mergers and master/feeder UCITS structures

3 CACEIS’s support

Summary

2 > UCITS IV•01/10/09