Financial Markets Conduct (Silverwood Land 2015 Limited Partnership) Exemption Notice 2024

Silverwood Land 2015 Limited Partnership (scheme) is a forestry scheme that has been winding up for several years. The scheme has some remaining real estate assets that it seeks to sell. The scheme is the subject of the Financial Markets Conduct (Silverwood Land 2015 Limited Partnership) Exemption Notice 2021, which is revoked on the close of 31 March 2024. The scheme applied to continue substantially the same exemptions for another three years to complete the wind up. 

The Financial Markets Conduct (Silverwood Land 2015 Limited Partnership) Exemption Notice 2024 (Notice) exempts the scheme from various licensing, governance, and financial reporting obligations under the Financial Markets Conduct Act 2013 (Act) and Financial Markets Conduct Regulations 2014. The effect of the exemptions is that the scheme will not need to have a licensed manager, will not need to update its governing documents, and its assets will not need to be held by the supervisor. The scheme will also be exempt from obtaining an annual assurance engagement, reconciling cash daily, and submitting quarterly reports where no limit break occurred.

The exemptions are subject to conditions to ensure adequate protection for scheme participants. Briefly, the conditions require the scheme’s real property to be held by the manager on trust for the supervisor with a registered encumbrance in favour of the supervisor, the frequency of obtaining annual assurance engagements and performing cash reconciliations is to be determined by the custodian subject to certain criteria. Whilst the manager does not have to be licensed and the scheme does not have to update its governing documents, the manager does have to prepare an updated wind up plan and regularly report to the supervisor progress against the plan, and notify any material changes or deviations from the plan.

The key reasons for granting the exemptions (as set out in the Statement of Reasons in the Notice) are that:

• granting the exemptions is desirable in order to promote the purposes of the Act. In particular, the exemptions will allow the scheme to avoid unnecessary compliance costs until it can complete winding up. The exemptions will also promote innovation and flexibility in the financial markets by allowing the scheme to continue to operate largely in accordance with its current governance structure (with alternative disclosure and reporting requirements) during its wind up; and
• the exemptions are not broader than is reasonably necessary to address the matters that gave rise to the exemptions because the exemptions are restricted to the scheme which has a finite life and special characteristics due to the nature and location of its investment.

Download the Financial Markets Conduct (Silverwood Land 2015 Limited Partnership) Exemption Notice 2024, PDF [314KB]