Following the proposed amendment of the German Investment Code, newly set-up AIFs will be qualified as open-ended AIFs if shares or units are repurchased or redeemed at the request of  its shareholders or unitholders, prior to the commencement of its liquidation phase or wind-down. The amendment also affects the AIFs established prior to the amendment.

In its recently published decision the Federal Finance Court stated that tax assessment concerning the uniform and separate determination of profits according to Sec. 180 (1) No. 2a General Fiscal Code of a foreign partnership has to be addressed to the partners of the partnership. Tax returns addressed to the foreign partnership as such are void by law.

This is a change to what the Court has ruled before (I R 33/06 BFH NV 2007, 2236),  where the Court stated the tax assessments had to be addressed to the partnership itself.

In the event of the acquisition of a credit portfolio, insurance companies and pension funds will receive the opportunity to register the mortgaged claims in a refinancing register (Refinanzierungsregister) as of January 1, 2014. With the registration the acquisition of the mortgaged claims would be insolvency-proof. As a result, credit portfolio transactions should be easier and safer to structure in the future.