1. Context
Since 1 January 2023, the investment funds managers (hereafter the “IFMs”) subject to the Sustainable Finance Disclosure Regulation (or “SFDR”) have been gathering and disclosing the required sustainability-related information about their financial products, in the form of a template, in line with the Level 2 SFDR introduced by Delegated Regulation (EU) 2022/1288 of 6 April 2022, as amended (the “SFDR RTS”).
On 25 March 2023, the Luxembourg regulator of the financial sector – the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier (the “CSSF”) – launched the digital data collection process (the “Process”) , as expected since its communication dated 27 July 2022 .
The Process is introduced by the CSSF as part of its role as competent authority designated to monitor the compliance with the SFDR requirements. The objective of the Process is to collect, in a digital format, the information contained in the pre-contractual disclosures made by the IFMs.
2. The data collection process
The participation to the Process is required for the following IFMs:
- UCITS management companies, based in Luxembourg or in another Member State of the European Union (“EU”), in relation to all Luxembourg-domiciled UCITS they manage;
- Authorised Luxembourg AIFMs, in relation to all Luxembourg-domiciled regulated and unregulated AIFs they manage;
- Authorised AIFMs, based in another Member State of the EU, in relation to all Luxembourg-domiciled regulated AIFs as well as any unregulated ELTIF they manage;
- Registered AIFMs, based in Luxembourg or in another Member State of the EU, in relation to all Luxembourg-domiciled regulated AIFs they manage.
The SFDR pre-contractual information will have to be completed by 15 June 2023 for each Luxembourg fund and sub-fund entering in the scope above.
Required SFDR data can be submitted to the CSSF via the following channels:
- A solution based on the submission of a structured file through S3 (“simple storage service”) protocol, which is already available; or
- An online solution via eDesk for manual input by the investment fund managers for each fund/sub-fund they manage. This solution will be made available as of 2 May 2023.
3. Key findings
It is important to note that the Process also applies with regards to unregulated Luxembourg-domiciled financial products that are not under the direct supervision of the CSSF i.e. (i) AIFs managed by authorised Luxembourg AIFM, (ii) AIFs managed by EU AIFMs, to the extent that such AIFs qualify as ELTIFs, (iii) AIFs managed by Luxembourg or EU registered AIFMs.
In addition, unlike the update of the pre-contractual disclosures in line with SFDR RTS which was strictly limited to products disclosing under Article 8 or Article 9 SFDR, the Process also covers products disclosing under Article 6 SFDR only.
For reference, the CSSF also published a user guide for practical and technical guidance.
