INTERNATIONAL: Singapore, Malaysia and Thailand introduce ASEAN CIS Framework

Wednesday October 2 2013

The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), the Securities Commission of Malaysia and Securities and Exchange Commission of Thailand have signed an agreement to facilitate the cross-border offering of collective investment schemes (CIS) to retail investors in the three countries. The signatories expect to implement the framework in the first half of 2014.

With this ASEAN CIS Framework, fund managers in one of the countries above will be able to offer their retail funds directly to investors in any of the other two countries under a streamlined process. Fund managers using this framework will have to abide by a set of common standards designed to ensure that the retail funds are managed based on industry best practices.

To facilitate the cross-border offering of collective investment schemes to non-retail investors, the three countries have agreed to provide mutual assistance in supervising offerings of such non-retail funds.