Viewpoint... A brief analysis of the criminal legal risk prevention of illegal fund-raising crimes in the field of private equity funds.

Published:

2021-12-15

A private equity fund (Private Fund) is an investment fund that raises funds from specific investors in a non-public manner and invests in a specific target. Private equity funds are recruited by means other than mass communication, and the promoters pool the funds of non-public diversified subjects to set up investment funds to invest in securities. With the improvement of China's financial and economic system, private equity funds have become a financial investment method recognized and supported by the state. At the same time, in order to regulate private equity fund activities, protect the legitimate rights and interests of investors and related parties, and promote the healthy development of the private equity investment fund industry, the China Securities Regulatory Commission has successively formulated and implemented the Interim Measures for the Supervision and Administration of Private Equity Investment Funds, and Securities and Futures Laws and regulations such as the Interim Provisions on the Operation and Management of Private Equity Asset Management Business of Operating Institutions, and the Provisions on Strengthening the Supervision of Private Equity Investment Funds. From the definition of private equity funds can be seen, fund raising, investment, the pursuit of return is the core of the main line of private equity funds. Private equity funds can easily trigger legal risks in the process of product design, management and operation, and even exit, especially the criminal legal risks of illegal fund-raising. According to the statistics of judicial practice, illegal fund-raising crimes have become the top ten high-incidence crimes among the 483 crimes in the Criminal Law, and more than 70% of the crimes triggered by private equity activities are illegal fund-raising crimes. Therefore, practitioners and related personnel in the field of private equity funds should pay close attention to the criminal legal risks of illegal fund-raising, and prevent violations of criminal law due to improper operation and triggering criminal legal risks. Illegal fund-raising is an act of absorbing funds from the public (including units and individuals) in violation of national financial management laws. In view of the complexity of illegal fund-raising criminal activities, in order to facilitate practical grasp, the "Judicial Interpretation of Illegal Fund-raising" specifically refines the elements of illegal fund-raising behavior, and clarifies that the establishment of illegal fund-raising needs to be illegal, open, inducement, and social. Four characteristics:(1) Absorbing funds without the approval of relevant departments in accordance with the law or borrowing the form of legal operations;(2) Publicize to the public through the media, promotion conferences, leaflets, mobile phone text messages, etc.;(3) Promise to repay the principal and interest or pay returns in currency, in kind, equity, etc. within a certain period of time;(4) To absorb funds from the public, that is, non-specific objects of society. 1. to avoid violating the national financial management laws and regulations, to prevent the violation of "illegal" characteristics With regard to private equity funds, China adopts the registration and filing system of the China Securities Investment Fund Industry Association, that is, the fund manager needs to register with the fund industry association; after the private equity fund is raised, the private equity fund manager shall, in accordance with the provisions of the fund industry association, handle the fund filing procedures. The above registration and filing are mandatory provisions, and fund managers must strictly abide by them. Violation of the above provisions is "violation of national financial management laws and regulations" and "without the approval of relevant national competent departments". Article 1 of the "Opinions on Several Issues Concerning the Handling of Criminal Cases of Illegal Fund-raising" issued by the Supreme People's Court, the Supreme People's Procuratorate, and the Ministry of Public Security in January 2019 stipulates the basis for determining the "illegality" of illegal fund-raising. The people's courts, people's procuratorates, and public security organs shall determine the "illegality" of illegal fund-raising based on national financial management laws and regulations. If the national financial management laws and regulations are only stipulated in principle, they can be determined in accordance with the spirit of the law and with reference to the departmental rules formulated by the people's Bank of China, the China Banking and Insurance Regulatory Commission, the China Securities Regulatory Commission and other administrative departments in accordance with the national financial management laws and regulations or the provisions of the state's relevant financial management regulations, measures, implementation rules and other normative documents. Accordingly, the "Interim Measures for the Supervision and Administration of Private Investment Funds" and other provisions issued by the China Securities Regulatory Commission can be used as a legal basis for judging whether private equity behavior has the characteristics of "illegality. Because the "Interim Measures" have made relevant provisions on the qualifications of fund-raising entities, fund-raising methods, fund-raising objects, and sources of fund-raising, violating these provisions is also a violation of "violation of national financial management laws and regulations". Of course, it is not that private equity funds have full legitimacy as long as they have gone through the registration and filing procedures, but failure to carry out legal registration and filing directly violates the constitutive element of "without the approval of the relevant national authorities. 2. standardize the way funds are raised to prevent violations of the "openness" feature. Private placement, as the name implies, is limited to "non-public" in the way of raising funds ". Article 6 of the "Several Provisions on Strengthening the Supervision of Private Equity Investment Funds" of the China Securities Regulatory Commission clearly stipulates that "private equity fund managers, private equity fund sales agencies and their employees shall not directly or indirectly have the following behaviors in the process of private equity fund raising: through newspapers, radio, Television, Internet and other public communication media, lectures, reports, analysis meetings, etc, notices, leaflets, text messages, instant messaging tools, blogs and e-mails and other carriers to promote and promote to unspecified targets." Therefore, any form of public communication, direct, indirect or otherwise, is prohibited by regulation. Private equity fund managers, private equity fund sales institutions and their practitioners should strictly abide by this provision, otherwise they will violate the "openness" feature. 3. improve the examination measures of qualified investors, penetrate the examination of qualified investors, and prevent the violation of "social" characteristics. According to the Measures for the Administration of the Suitability of Securities and Futures Investors, the Measures for the Administration of Private Investment Fund Raising Behavior, and the Instructions for the Filing of Private Investment Funds, private equity fund managers, private equity fund sales agencies and their practitioners should conduct the following two aspects Review. First, the verification of investors' risk identification ability and affordability. The specific verification standards are clearly stipulated in the "Measures for the Supervision and Administration of Private Investment Funds": (1) The amount invested in a single private equity fund shall not be less than 1 million yuan;(2) The net assets of unit investors shall not be less than 10 million yuan;(3) Personal financial assets shall not be less than 3 million yuan or the average annual personal income in the last three years shall not be less than 500000 yuan." Second, the number of qualified investors is limited: the number of investors in a single private equity fund shall not exceed the number of restrictions stipulated in the Company Law, the Partnership Law, and the Securities Investment Fund Law. The maximum number of legal fundraisers for partnership and corporate private equity funds is 50. In terms of review measures, it is possible to verify whether the investor (legal person) meets the criteria for qualified investors by reviewing the year-end net assets, audited financial statements, financial asset supporting documents, personal annual income and other evidentiary materials. Where a private equity fund manager sells private equity funds on its own, it shall adopt questionnaires and other methods to evaluate the investor's risk identification ability and risk-bearing ability, and the investor shall make a written commitment to meet the conditions of qualified investors. Where a private equity fund manager entrusts a sales agency to sell a private equity fund, the private equity fund sales agency shall take the measures such as the evaluation and confirmation provided for in the preceding paragraph. The content and format guidelines of the questionnaire and risk disclosure letter of investors' risk identification ability and bearing ability are formulated by the fund industry association according to the characteristics of different types of private equity funds. In response to the phenomenon of "holding on behalf" to circumvent the restrictions on the number of private equity funds and investment limits, the "Instructions for the Filing of Private Equity Funds" stipulates: "For private equity funds invested in the form of partnerships and other illegal entities, the raising institution shall penetrate to verify whether the final investor is a qualified investor and calculate the number of investors in combination." In response to the issue of private equity fund share transfer, the "Private Investment Fund Filing Instructions" stipulates: "The fundraising institution shall ensure that the investor is aware of the private equity fund transfer conditions, and the investor shall promise in writing to purchase the private equity fund for himself, and complete the private equity fund risk disclosure After that, the fundraising institution shall require investors to provide necessary asset certification documents or income certification." At the specific operational level of private equity funds, the qualification verification of qualified investors is an important aspect to ensure the legitimacy of the object of raising funds, and also an important guarantee to ensure that private equity funds raise funds from "specific objects. 4. standardize propaganda behavior, grasp the distribution principle of benefit sharing, risk sharing, risk and income matching, and prevent the violation of "inducement" characteristics. Article 1 of the Supreme People's Court's Interpretation on Several Issues Concerning the Specific Application of Laws in the Trial of Criminal Cases of Illegal Fund-raising stipulates: "Violation of national financial management laws and regulations, the act of absorbing funds from the public (including units and individuals) meets the following four conditions. Unless otherwise provided in the Criminal Law, it shall be deemed as" illegal absorption of public deposits or absorption of public deposits in disguised form "as stipulated in Article 176 of the Criminal Law: promise to repay principal and interest or pay returns in money, in kind, equity, etc. within a certain period of time." This is the provision for the "inducement" feature, which is commonly referred to as "capital preservation". And private equity fund is a kind of investment behavior, income and risk go hand in hand. Private equity fund managers and private equity fund sales institutions shall not promise investors that the principal of the investment shall not be lost or that the minimum return shall be promised, the expected return shall not be promised, and the performance comparison shall not be publicized. The Interim Provisions on the operation and management of private equity asset management business of securities and futures operating institutions issued by China Securities Regulatory Commission clearly states that "securities and futures operating institutions and relevant sales institutions shall not sell asset management plans in violation of regulations, and shall not have improper publicity, mislead and cheat investors, or promise to investors in any way without loss of principal or minimum income, Including but not limited to the following situations: there are expressions in asset management contracts and sales materials that contain the connotation of capital preservation, such as zero risk, guaranteed income, and worry-free principal; The name of the asset management plan contains the word "capital preservation"; sign repurchase agreements or commitment letters and other documents with investors in private, and directly or indirectly promise capital preservation and income protection; promise capital preservation and income protection to investors orally or through various methods such as SMS and WeChat; Promote the expected rate of return of the asset management plan to investors; Exaggerate or one-sided promote products, exaggerated or one-sided publicity of the past performance of the asset management plan manager and the products under his management, investment managers, etc., did not fully disclose the product risks, and investors did not sign risk disclosure letters and asset management contracts when subscribing to the asset management plan. For structured funds that are more likely to violate the characteristics of "inducement" in judicial practice, the "Interim Regulations" specifically clarify: "The establishment of structured asset management plans by securities and futures operating institutions shall not violate benefit sharing, risk sharing, and matching of risks and returns. The following situations shall not exist: (1) Directly or indirectly provide capital protection and income arrangements to subscribers of priority shares, including but not limited to the provision of priority share income, early termination penalty interest, inferior or third-party institutions to make up the difference of priority income, provision of risk margin to make up the priority income, etc. agreed in the contract of structured asset management plan; (II) fail to conduct sufficient and appropriate due diligence on the identity and risk bearing capacity of inferior share subscribers of structured asset management plan; the (III) fails to fully disclose and disclose the structured design and corresponding risk situation, income distribution, wind control measures and other information in the asset management contract; The leverage ratio of (IV) stock and hybrid structured asset management plans exceeds 1 times, the leverage ratio of fixed income structured asset management plans exceeds 3 times, and the leverage ratio of other types of structured asset management plans exceeds 2 times. It is (V) to check the investment target of structured asset management plans through penetration, the structured asset management plan nests and invests in the inferior share of other structured financial products; the name of the (VI) structured asset management plan does not contain the words" structured "or" graded "; the total assets of the (VII) structured asset management plan account for more than 140 per cent of net assets, and the total assets of the unstructured collective asset management plan (I. e." one-to-many ") account for more than 200 per cent of net assets." On the issue of credit enhancement measures such as guarantees provided by third parties. First of all, the credit enhancement measures can not be simply identified as "capital preservation and income protection"; second, it is not prohibited to take relevant credit enhancement measures in the asset management plan from the level of laws and regulations; third, it should be legal, true and effective in the implementation of third-party credit enhancement measures, so as to prevent the occurrence of credit enhancement measures as a means of "capital preservation and income protection" in disguise. With respect to premium repurchase and gambling agreements, attention should be paid to the design of the trigger clause in the Equity or Fund Share Repurchase Agreement to prevent the occurrence of an agreement on the contingency of the achievement of the condition as inevitable. With regard to the dividend mechanism, the issue of the source of dividend funds should be strictly grasped. Dividend funds should be derived from the investment income of the fund, not the fund itself, otherwise it may be found to be in line with the characteristics of "inducement" in judicial practice.

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