SEC Continuing Focus On Real Estate Fund Advisers

The Securities and Exchange Commission ("SEC") initially focused on newly registered hedge fund and private equity fund managers once private fund managers were required to register as investment advisers as a result of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. But Igor Rozenblit, co-head of the SEC's private funds unit ("PFU"), signaled at Private Equity International's CFO and CCO Forum in New York in January 2015 the PFU's intention to look "beyond buyout funds" and examine "adjacent illiquid asset classes."

This was followed up on May 13, 2015, by Marc Wyatt, the then acting director of the SEC's Office of Compliance Inspections and Examinations ("OCIE"), when he addressed the Private Equity International Private Fund Compliance Forum in New York. Wyatt noted that while progress has been made toward addressing a number of important issues in the private equity fund industry, there is still room for improvement, including in the areas of