Still not too much excitement on the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive (AIFMD) – the general view seems to be that there is still plenty of time before implementation will be necessary and of course given that we are at Level 1 at this stage and the real negotiations will only begin as Level 2 gets worked out there seems to be no sense of urgency.
A strength of most alternative firms of course is that they do have the ability to adapt rapidly to market changes so the lack of urgency itself gives no real cause for alarm. When they have to change – they will.
But it is the sense of business as usual that is more of a cause for concern and so one hopes that the Level 2 negotiations to work out the operationalisation of the AIFMD will result in some sensible thinking to make the AIFMD a vehicle for good rather than a regulatory stone around industry’s neck.
One can only hope that this is not the beginning of another round of regulatory arbitrage.
The year end was a busy one for a number of reasons – now it is time to analyse the detail of the AIFMD to properly understand its implications for hedge fund management and hedge fund investors.
©Jaitly LLP
