The Danish Venture Capital and Private Equity Association has published "Active ownership and transparency in private equity funds: guidelines for responsible ownership and good corporate governance". The guidelines, which operate on the 'comply or explain' basis, contain rules governing the disclosure of information to supplement the requirements, where relevant, of the Danish Financial Statements Act. In the report it is stated:...it has to be recognised that today’s private equity funds own companies that may be of broad interest to society. These may be companies that are important for infrastructure or play a major role in the local area. They may also be companies that employ large numbers of people. In addition, many investors in private equity funds are pension funds, whose most important stakeholders are pension savers – typically ordinary salary earners. The general public may therefore have an interest in gaining insight into how a private equity fund works and creates value. This is the background to why these guidelines specify a number of areas where private equity funds and their portfolio companies should publish information.
According to a report in the Financial Times newspaper:
Denmark has leapfrogged the UK and adopted the most far-reaching guidelines to improve the transparency of private equity funds. The new voluntary code ... is designed to rehabilitate the reputation of private equity in Denmark, but will also increase pressure on the industry in the rest of Europe to follow suit to avert the threat of national or EU imposed rules. The UK and Sweden have already published voluntary guidelines to try to head off such rules but the DVCA's proposals go much further by covering 80 per cent of private equity-owned companies - compared to just the 100 largest under the UK guidelines - and requiring a far higher level of disclosure."
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