On 4 February 2019, the Dutch Minister of Finance (the Minister) proposed an amendment to the Exemption Regulation AFS (Vrijstellingsregeling Wft, the Regulation), stipulating that Article 10 of the Regulation (also known as: the third-country regime) will temporarily apply to investment firms from the UK if the UK and the EU have not entered into an agreement on the exit of the UK from the EU by 29 March 2019.

The exemption of Article 10 of the Regulation means that investment firms from the UK are exempted from a licence obligation for providing investment services and/or the investment activity dealing on own account in the Netherlands, insofar provided to professional investors or eligible counterparties. Furthermore, the investment firm will need to be supervised in the UK and it will need to notify the Netherlands Authority for the Financial Markets (Autoriteit Financiële Markten, the AFM). The investment firm will also largely be exempted from the prudential and ongoing code of conduct requirements as set out in the Act on the Financial Supervision (Wet op het financieel toezicht, AFS).

The amendments are expected to come into force when there is a no-deal Brexit and will be applicable until the end of 2020.

View the proposed amendments to the Regulation (Dutch only), 4 February 2019.