The Swiss private banking house Mirabaud has created a new company, Mirabaud Asset Management (Europe), as part of managing its compliance with the requirements of the new UCITS IV directive.

Mirabaud Asset Management (Europe) was established on 15 April 2011 in Luxembourg and has received authorisation from the financial supervisory authority of the Grand Duchy, the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier.

The new company is the first Luxembourg management company to obtain authorisation under the requirements of UCITS IV, which was implemented under Luxembourg law in December 2010. The new directive comes into effect on 1 July 2011.

Mirabaud aims to rationalise its activities by centralising the distribution, management and administration of its investment vehicles within Luxembourg. The management company will initially oversee fund activities under Luxembourg law, but the goal is to centralise, within Luxembourg, the activities related to a number of funds held under French, Spanish and UK law.

“The implementation of this text will indeed be an important step in the creation of a large unified market,” said Lionel Aeschlimann, managing partner and head of asset management at Mirabaud.

“This [the formation of the new entity] will make it easier to market our funds in all EU countries and will allow us to concentrate and consolidate investment fund management in a single location.” 

Mirabaud Asset Management (Europe) will be temporarily based at 26 du Boulevard Royal, in Luxembourg City and will be placed under the leadership of Carine Laurent-Jayer, who formerly spent 15 years at PricewaterhouseCoopers, where she was an audit director within the asset management group, and Marlène Valentin, an operative fund manager for Mirabaud and director of the self-governed open-end investment companies Mirabaud Equities and Mirabaud Select Equities.