HONG KONG: SFC publishes consultation conclusions on pre-vetting of notices and advertisements of CIS

Thursday June 26 2008

The SFC has today published its conclusions in respect to its consultation paper on the proposal to streamline the pre-vetting of notices and advertisement authorised collective investment schemes (CIS).

The consultation paper which mainly proposed the removal pre-vetting for the majority of notices as well as advertisements falling within the exemptions under the Securities and Futures Ordinance, and the establishment of a common set of advertising guidelines for all schemes authorised under the four Product Codes (Code on Unit Trusts and Mutual Funds, the Code on Investment-Linked Assurance Schemes, the Code on Pooled Retirement Funds and the Code on MPF Products)- found support from the 16 responses received.

The SFC will implement the proposal to streamline the pre-vetting of notices and advertisements by revising the Product Codes and the advertising guidelines. In particular, the SFC will further streamline the pre-vetting of insignificant scheme changes and the related revisions to the offering documents.

The revisions to the Product Codes and the revised Advertising Guidelines will be gazetted and made effective by 1st August 2008. The SFC will then concurrently cease pre-vetting the eligible notices and advertisements. Advertisement issuers are permitted to continue to follow the current Advertising Guidelines included in the respective Product Codes until 31 December 2008, but they must comply with the revised Advertising Guidelines from 1 January 2009.

Click on the above link for the consultation conclusions.

The consultation paper issued in January 2008 can be found on the link below :

https://www.sfc.hk/sfcConsultation/EN/sfcConsultMainServlet?name=prevetting`https://www.sfc.hk/sfcConsultation/EN/sfcConsultMainServlet?name=prevetting