- Malta seeks to bring home funds
- Draws attention to possibility of non-dom external custodians
Hot on the heels of Irish legislation to facilitate redomiciliation (as reported in last month's Hedgeline) the Malta Financial Services Authority of Malta has published its own guidelines for the redomiciliation of offshore funds (http://tinyurl.com/yg5pt9k) on 8 January.
The MFSA says the need for guidelines has arisen because of an increase in the number of managers enquiring about redomiciliation procedures in recent months. This it attributes to the flexibility of a regime which "allows funds to have external administrators and custodians in contrast to other jurisdictions which require the service providers to be present in the domicile."
The guidelines specify the documentation required from fund promoters and outline the way the process is handled by the Authorisation Unit and the Registry of Companies.
In the past decade Malta has been actively encouraging the growth of its financial services industry and managed to increase the value of funds domiciled on the island from €500 million to €5 billion, between 2000 and 2007. The MFSA expects its new guidance to accelerate this growth, and in addition, recognition of Malta as a well-regulated and efficient European financial services centre.
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