media release (18-222MR)

ASIC updates guidance for funds management industry

Published

ASIC has released a suite of seven new and updated regulatory guides to provide comprehensive guidance to the funds management industry. The guidance has been updated for changes arising from the Asia Region Funds Passport and brings all of ASIC's funds management policies up to date to help promote industry-wide consistency.

The updates are designed to help the funds management industry to access the Asia Region Funds Passport.  The passport is designed to provide investors with access to funds from participating economies throughout the Asia region.

The new and updated regulatory guides are:

The updates are comprehensive, including both administrative and substantive issues. Inclusions that may be particularly helpful to the funds management industry include:

  • providing information on ASIC’s decision-making process for registering a managed investment scheme or passport fund
  • providing good practice examples and case studies on a range of compliance issues, including previous ASIC decisions on relief.

Further, RG 132 has guidance on compliance management systems consistent with Australian Standard AS ISO 19600:2015: Compliance management systems—Guidelines (AS ISO 19600:2015). This guidance is not mandatory, although the funds management industry generally already complies with AS ISO 19600:2015. The changes outline the type of compliance management system we believe can be adopted to enhance compliance with legal and regulatory obligations. 

The legal requirements for the contents of a registered scheme's compliance plan and its audit have not changed. Our guidance in RG 132 sets out our current view of these requirements. The updates do not include changes arising from corporate collective investment vehicles (CCIVs), as the legislation has not yet passed through Parliament. ASIC will review and re-release these seven regulatory guides to include material for the new CCIV regime after this regime is implemented into Australian law. 

ASIC will make a range of less substantive amendments to other regulatory guides. These amendments will reflect the consequential amendments that will be made to the Corporations Act to accommodate these new regimes.

Background

In October 2017, we released CP 296 with proposals to publish the six new and updated regulatory guides to reflect ASIC’s current views on these topics. We also proposed to include the guidance in the appendix to RG 134 in a separate regulatory guide, and have implemented that proposal by publishing RG 137 . Our proposals applied to managed investment schemes, CCIVs, Australian passport funds and certain other AFS licensees involved in funds management.

We received 10 submissions in response to CP 296. Further information on the feedback ASIC received can be found in Report 582 Response to submissions on CP 296 Funds management (REP 582). REP 582 also includes feedback received on our proposals for CCIVs.

The Asia Region Funds Passport will provide a multilaterally agreed framework to facilitate the cross-border marketing of passport funds across participating economies in the Asia region. The legislative changes for the Asia Region Funds Passport have been implemented in Australia through the Corporations Amendment (Asia Region Funds Passport) Bill 2018.  The Asia Region Funds Passport is an initiative of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation Group (APEC).

The CCIV regime is proposed to be implemented in Australia through amendments to legislation, including the Corporations Act.

The CCIV regime will be an optional alternative to the existing managed investments regime in Ch 5C of the Corporations Act.

Download

Regulatory guides

Report and submissions

Information sheet

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