The Cayman Islands Monetary Authority (CIMA) has announced that the fund annual return (FAR) form for funds registered under the Private Funds Act (Revised) (private funds) is now available, together with the related fund entities (RFE) form, which must be used by private funds to submit data regarding certain related fund entities. The FAR form is a Microsoft Excel-based form through which CIMA collects certain operating and financial information from regulated private funds. The FAR form can be downloaded by auditors or other designated submitters (ie, certain Cayman Islands service providers) for provision to persons responsible for compiling this information on behalf of a private fund. Once the FAR form has been completed, it can be returned to the designated submitter and uploaded by them to CIMA's portal. The RFE form is intended to capture information regarding certain related fund entities (ie, entities established by or on behalf of the promoter of the private fund which may account for certain regulatory, tax and other structuring needs of one or more groups of persons) which may themselves not meet the definition of a private fund. RFEs include a parallel fund, an alternative investment vehicle or a co-investment vehicle (these are the only types which may be reported on the RFE form) and may be established in any jurisdiction. The RFE form must be completed on CIMA's portal at the same time as the submission of the related FAR form.
Due to the delay in publishing the RFE form in particular, the deadline for the first filing of audited accounts and the associated FAR forms and RFE forms by all private funds has been extended to 31 October 2021. CIMA has previously issued an industry notice confirming that private funds will not be subject to penalties for non-compliance with annual audit filing requirements prior to an earlier 30 September 2021 deadline, and it may be assumed that this allowance is now extended to the revised 31 October 2021 deadline. Without this extension, a private fund would generally be required to file its FAR and RFE forms within six months of each financial year ending after 7 February 2020. Due to the extension, a private fund which had a financial year end falling on or prior to 30 April must file its FAR and RFE forms for both the 2020 and 2021 financial years, as applicable, by 31 October 2021.
On 25 March 2021 the Private Funds (Annual Returns) Regulations 2021 were published. These regulations set out the operating and financial information required to be submitted in the FAR form for private funds on an annual basis.(1)
The extension relates only to the FAR forms and RFE forms for private funds. FAR forms relating to open-ended mutual funds registered under the Mutual Funds Act (Revised) must still be filed within six months of the relevant financial year end.
For further information on this topic please contact Joanne Huckle, Nick Rogers, Justin Savage or Dave Sherwin at Ogier by telephone (+1 345 949 9876) or email ([email protected], [email protected], [email protected] or [email protected]). The Ogier website can be accessed at www.ogier.com.
Endnotes
(1) For more information, please see "Cayman Islands Funds and Regulatory Update: Q1 2021".