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Article 10
Shareholders and members with qualifying holdings
1. The competent authorities shall not authorise the performance of investment services or activities by an investment firm until they have been informed of the identities of the
shareholders or members, whether direct or indirect, natural or legal persons, that have qualifying holdings and the amounts of those holdings.
The competent authorities shall refuse authorisation if, taking into account the need to ensure the sound and prudent management of an investment firm, they are not satisfied as to the suitability of the shareholders or members that have qualifying holdings.
Where close links exist between the investment firm and other natural or legal persons, the competent authority shall grant authorisation only if those links do not prevent the effective exercise of the supervisory functions of the competent authority.
2. The competent authority shall refuse authorisation if the laws, regulations or administrative provisions of a third country governing one or more natural or legal persons with which the undertaking has close links, or difficulties involved in their
enforcement, prevent the effective exercise of its supervisory functions.
3. Member States shall require any natural or legal person that proposes to acquire or sell, directly or indirectly, a qualifying holding in an investment firm, first to notify, in accordance with the second subparagraph, the competent authority of the size of the resulting holding.
Such persons shall likewise be required to notify the competent authority if they propose to increase or reduce their qualifying holding, if in consequence the proportion of the voting rights or of the capital that they hold would reach or fall below or exceed 20%, 33% or 50% or the investment firm would become or cease to be their subsidiary.
Without prejudice to paragraph 4, the competent authority shall have up to three months from the date of the notification of a proposed acquisition provided for in the first subparagraph to oppose such a plan if, in view of the need to ensure sound and prudent management of the investment firm, it is not satisfied as to the suitability of the persons referred to in the first subparagraph.
If the competent authority does not oppose the plan, it may fix a deadline for its implementation.
4. If the acquirer of any holding referred to in paragraph 3 is an investment firm, a credit institution, an insurance undertaking or a UCITS management company authorised in another Member State, or the parent undertaking of an investment firm, credit institution, insurance undertaking or a UCITSmanagement company authorised in another Member State, or a person controlling an investment firm, credit institution, insurance undertaking or a UCITS management company authorised in another Member State, and if, as a result of that acquisition, the undertaking would become the acquirer's subsidiary or come under his control, the assessment of the acquisition shall be subject to the prior consultation provided for in Article 60.
5. Member States shall require that, if an investment firm becomes aware of any acquisitions or disposals of holdings in its capital that cause holdings to exceed or fall below any of the thresholds referred to in the first subparagraph of paragraph 3, that investment firm is to inform the competent authority without delay.
At least once a year, investment firms shall also inform the competent authority of the names of shareholders and members possessing qualifying holdings and the sizes of such holdings as shown, for example, by the information received at annual general meetings of shareholders and members or as a result of compliance with the regulations applicable to companies whose transferable securities are admitted to trading on a regulated market.
6. Member States shall require that, where the influence exercised by the persons referred to in the first subparagraph of paragraph 1 is likely to be prejudicial to the sound and prudent management of an investment firm, the competent authority take appropriate measures to put an end to that situation.
Such measures may consist in applications for judicial orders and/or the imposition of sanctions against directors and those responsible for management, or suspension of the exercise of the voting rights attaching to the shares held by the shareholders or members in question.
Similar measures shall be taken in respect of persons who fail to comply with the obligation to provide prior information in relation to the acquisition or increase of a qualifying holding.
If a holding is acquired despite the opposition of the competent authorities, the Member States shall, regardless of any other sanctions to be adopted, provide either for exercise of the corresponding voting rights to be suspended, for the nullity of the votes cast or for the possibility of their annulment.
MIFID - Article 10 - Shareholders and members with qualifying holdings
