The Legal 500

Legal Update March 2013.

Luxembourg, 24 April 2013 - MOLITOR Avocats à la Cour , one of Luxembourg's leading Business law firms announces that Laurent Fisch will leave the firm on 15 May 2013 . Having recently become increasingly involved in the highly complicated and lengthy liquidation of Lehman Brothers, and to avoid any potential client conflict issues, he has decided to pursue his career independently.

Double taxation avoidance treaties concluded between two states seek to prevent the taxation in both countries of income and capital. Chevalier & Sciales has created this treaty table to provide you with an accurate and updated view of Luxembourg double tax treaties in force or currently pending.

The purpose of this investment memorandum is to provide an overview of the investment vehicles (i.e. regulated, lightly regulated and unregulated) that Luxembourg offers to (foreign) entrepreneurs and managers. The table compares the UCITS, part II fund, SIF, SICAR, SPF, securitization vehicle and soparfi. The overview covers inter alia the legal and regulatory requirements, the shareholding, the approval and supervision, taxation issues (such as the benefit from the EU Parent Subsidiary directive and double tax treaties and thin capitalisation rules), etc.

Legal Update March 2013.

On 15 March 2013 ESMA published a set of questions and answers giving further details on the content of its guidelines on ETFs and other UCITS issues (ESMA/2012/832) which entered into force on 18 February 2013, subject to certain transitional provisions for existing UCITS.

On 7 March 2013, the Court of Justice of the European Union (“CJEU”) rendered its decision in the “GfBK” case (C-275/11), dealing with the question of whether investment advisory services in the fund industry benefit from a VAT exemption.

On 18 February 2013, the Luxembourg regulator (the CSSF) published Circular 13/559 on the implementation into Luxembourg law of ESMA guidelines 2012/832 on ETFs and other UCITS issues.

Overview of the key changes for private banking suggested in the Council's Compromise in relation to both the Parliament's Position and the MiFID II Proposal.

On 21 December 2012, Luxembourg has adopted a law on the activity of Family Offices (the “Law”). Luxembourg is thus one of the first countries to implement a specific and coordinated legal and regulatory framework for the activity of Family Offices. Within this new framework, the activity of a Family Office will be reserved to specific Luxembourg professionals, which will have to comply with additional professional obligations.

The Regulation (EU) No 648/2012 of the European Parliament and the Council of 4 July 2012 on OTC derivatives, central counterparties and trade repositories (the so-called European Market Infrastructure Regulation; "EMIR") entered into force on 16 August 2012.