Europe: private equity - review of industry codes

The European Internal Market Commissioner, Charlie McCreevy, has announced that he is conducting a review of the codes adopted by the private equity industry, considering their scope, content and performance. His findings are due to be reported to the European Parliament in March 2009. 

In his speech, Commissioner McCreevy acknowledged that there were concerns regarding corporate governance, transparency and reporting. He identified three areas that his review would concentrate upon:

• The coverage and adoption of codes (McCreevy noted the limited adoption of the Walker Guidelines)
  
• The monitoring and mechanisms for promoting compliance with the relevant codes
• Consistency across Member States

This review follows the European Parliament's adoption of a resolution earlier this year in which it recommended:

The Commission should undertake an examination of all existing Community legislation relevant to financial markets in order to identify any lacunae as regards the regulation of hedge funds and private equity and, based on the results of such examination, to submit to the European Parliament a legislative proposal or proposals amending the existing directives where necessary, in order better to regulate hedge funds, private equity and other relevant actors. Such proposed regulation should be purposive"