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Ireland
On 31 October 2023, the Screening of Third Country Transactions Act 2023 (the “Act”), which establishes a new foreign direct investment ("FDI") screening regime in Ireland, was enacted.
United Kingdom | Publication | November 2023
On November 6, 2023, the trustees of the £590m Sears Retail Pension Scheme reached an agreement to enter into the UK’s first ever superfund transaction with Clara Pensions. A superfund is an arrangement set up to consolidate DB schemes’ liabilities, in which the link to the sponsoring employer is severed following transfer.
The deal, which has been cleared by the Regulator, will see Clara make an additional £30m of ring-fenced funding to support the 9,600-member scheme. The scheme’s assets will be used to generate returns to pay pensions, with the aim of securing a full buy-out deal with an insurer within five to ten years.
This long-awaited first transaction is seen as significant for both Clara and the pensions industry as a whole. It has the potential to be the catalyst for transformative change in the pensions industry, providing a “safe bridge” bringing the insurance market into reach for more schemes and their members.
Publication
On 31 October 2023, the Screening of Third Country Transactions Act 2023 (the “Act”), which establishes a new foreign direct investment ("FDI") screening regime in Ireland, was enacted.
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The EU Foreign Subsidies Regulation, or FSR, is intended to prevent or remedy distortions of the EU internal market caused by “foreign” – meaning non-EU – subsidies benefitting companies active in the EU.
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The conventional wisdom is that ‘securitisation caused the great financial crisis’ (GFC). A further piece of conventional wisdom is that this was due to the misalignment of incentives between securitisation originators and securitisation investors . This conventional wisdom in turn drove much of the regulation of securitisation we now have.
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