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Setting Up a VCC
 

Highlights

About Variable Capital Companies (VCC)

The Variable Capital Company (VCC) is a new corporate structure for investment funds constituted under the Variable Capital Companies Act which took effect on 14 Jan 2020. The VCC will complement the existing suite of investment fund structures available in Singapore. 

The VCC Act and subsidiary legislation is administered by ACRA. All VCCs must be managed by a Permissible Fund Manager 1 . The anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism obligations of VCCs will come under the purview of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). 

Some key features of a VCC

  • A VCC has a variable capital structure that provides flexibility in the issuance and redemption of its shares. It can also pay dividends out of capital, which gives fund managers flexibility to meet dividend payment obligations.
  • A VCC can be set up as a single standalone fund or an umbrella fund with two or more sub-funds, each holding a portfolio of segregated assets and liabilities. For fund managers that structure their funds as umbrella VCCs, there may be cost efficiencies from using common service providers across the umbrella and its sub-funds.
  • A VCC can be used for both open-ended and closed-end fund strategies 2 .
  • Fund managers may incorporate new VCCs or re-domicile their existing overseas investment funds with comparable structures by transferring their registration to Singapore as VCCs.
  • VCCs must maintain a register of shareholders, which need not be made public. However, this register must be disclosed to public authorities upon request for regulatory, supervisory and law enforcement purposes. 
More details pertaining to the VCC framework can be found at www.mas.gov.sg.
 
[1] Generally, a VCC will have to be managed by a fund manager which is a licensed fund management company (i.e. a holder of a capital markets services licence for fund management under section 86 of the Securities and Futures Act (Cap. 289)), a registered fund management company (i.e. a corporation exempted from holding a capital markets services licence under paragraph 5(1)(i) of the Second Schedule to the Securities and Futures (Licensing and Conduct of Business) Regulations) or a person exempted under the Section 99(1)(a), (b), (c), or (d) of the Securities and Futures Act (Cap. 289) from the requirement to hold a capital markets services licence to carry on business in fund management (i.e. a bank licensed under the Banking Act (Cap. 19), a merchant bank approved under the Monetary Authority of Singapore Act (Cap. 186), a finance company licensed under the Finance Companies Act (Cap. 108), or a company or cooperative society licensed under the Insurance Act (Cap. 142)).

[2] An open-ended fund allows investors to redeem their investments at their discretion, while a closed-end fund does not permit investors to do so. Closed-end funds also have a fixed number of shares and do not allow new subscriptions after the offering period is over, while open-ended funds are open to new subscriptions by new investors at any time. 
 

Setting up a Variable Capital Company (VCC)

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