At the end of March, the Luxembourg Minister of Finance forwarded a bill to the Grand Duchy's parliament, which is intended to modernize Luxembourg's investment law. It provides for amendments to the product laws for SICAR, FIS, FIAR and retail funds as well as to the AIFM law (Luxembourg's implementation of the AIFM Directive). We present the most important changes from our point of view.

The German 2022 Annual Tax Act will again result in changes for companies that are neither domiciled in Germany nor in the EU if they wish to repay capital to their shareholders in a tax-neutral manner. While the German Federal Ministry of Finance (Bundesfinanzministerium, or “BMF”) had just acknowledged the long-standing case law of the German Federal Fiscal Court (Bundesfinanzhof) in its Circular dated April 21, 2022, stating that these so-called third-country (non-EU) capital companies can also repay capital reserves and nominal capital in a tax-neutral manner, and under which conditions this is accepted by the German tax administration, the amendment to the law again gives rise to new questions for the legal practitioner. Particularly for investors in alternative investment funds, the now established statutory application requirement represents a practical hurdle that is difficult to overcome.

After almost four years of waiting, the US Treasury Department and the IRS have finally issued Final Regulations with regard to “qualified foreign pension funds” (“QFPF”) and their tax treatment under US tax laws. The Final Regulations provide welcomed guidance for investments by foreign investors in US real property interests.