Times Online – The role of the City of London as one of the world’s preeminent financial centres came under attack for the second time in two weeks yesterday, this time from proposed EU rules for private equity and hedge funds.

The EU wants private equity firms with more than €500 million under management and hedge funds with more than €100 million of funds to file detailed financial information with the Financial Services Authority. Private equity firms will also need to file figures relating to debt, risk and cash.

If the European Parliament approves the proposed legislation, about 1,000 British companies – owned by private equity firms either headquartered or with an office in the EU and with more than €500 million under management – would be saddled with annual compliance costs estimated at about £30,000.

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Tags: 100-million, city-of-london, compliance costs, debt risk, european parliament, financial centres, financial information, financial-services-authority, parliament, preeminent, private equity firms, proposed-legislation, second-time

Mena Report – The Dubai Multi Commodities Centre Authority (DMCCA) and Shariah Capital, Inc. (SCAP.L) today announced the Dubai Shariah Hedge Fund Index, the first internationally-recognised index comprised exclusively of Shariah compliant hedge funds.  The Dubai Shariah Hedge Fund Index will be calculated and reported by Thomson Reuters (NYSE:TRI), the global news and financial information organisation. 

The Index reflects the performance of the DSAM Kauthar Commodity Fund, Ltd. (“DKCF”).  DKCF is an equally-weighted fund-of-funds comprised initially of four single- strategy, commodity-focused funds that invest exclusively in Shariah compliant long/short equity hedge funds on the Al Safi Trust platform.  The Al Safi Trust is a comprehensive Shariah compliant platform designed specifically for hedge funds and launched recently by Barclays Capital and Shariah Capital.  Distributed under the DSAM Kauthar label, the four funds underlying the index have been seeded with US$50 million each by DMCCA.

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Tags: 50-million, barclays, barclays capital, commodities, commodity, dsam, equity hedge, financial information, fund-index, global news, information organisation, long short equity, nyse, reuters, safi, scap, shariah capital, thomson