EU Amending Technical Standards Improve PRIIPs Regulation Requirements

An EU Commission Delegated Regulation (2021/2268) amending the Regulatory Technical Standards supplementing the EU Packaged Retail Investment and Insurance-based Products Regulation has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union. The amending RTS include provisions to:

• Introduce new methodologies to calculate appropriate performance scenarios and a revised presentation of these scenarios.
• Revise the summary cost indicators and changes to the content and presentation of information on the costs of PRIIPs.
• Modify the methodology to calculate transaction costs.
• Clarify the rules for PRIIPs offering a range of options for investment (known as MOPs), in particular, to identify the products' full cost implications.

The amending RTS will apply directly across the EU from July 1, 2022. Commissioner Mairead McGuiness has stated that 2022 will see a broader review of the EU PRIIPS Regulation. The EU PRIIPs regime was intended to improve investor disclosures for more complex retail products such as index-tracking investments and insurance-wrapped products. However, it has resulted in deleterious impacts in other industries and has been widely criticized for its vagueness of scope and wide application, with particularly difficult consequences for bond issuers, listed derivatives and funds. The U.K. Financial Conduct Authority is undertaking a review of the U.K. Packaged Retail and Insurance-based Investment Products Regulation, which was on-shored in the U.K. after Brexit and is based upon the corresponding EU regulation. The FCA's review covers the scope of the PRIIPs regime, as it applies to corporate bonds, misleading performance scenarios and summary risk indicators, and concerns about the transaction costs calculation methodology. The FCA is expected to publish its feedback to the consultation and rules in Q1 2022, including information on when the revised rules will apply.

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