Europe: European Commission Delays “Non-Essential” Level 2 Measures Concerning AIFMD II and the UCITS Review
By: Gayle Bowen, Shane Geraghty, Mathieu Volckrick, and Dr. Philipp Riedl
In a letter dated 1 October 2025, the European Commission has announced that it will not adopt any non-essential Level 2 acts in respect of AIFMD II or the UCITS review, before 1 October 2027 at the earliest. The list of “non-essential” measures now postponed includes technical standards (i) for loan-originating funds to maintain open-ended features and (ii) on information exchange between national regulators and EU institutions.
It is further reported that the Commission has considered amending, or even repealing, certain acts via an Omnibus package dedicated towards Level 2 measures.
The European Securities and Markets Authority was due to deliver the final draft measures on open-ended loan-originating funds to the Commission this month following their earlier consultation on this topic. It is unclear whether this will now happen.
The Commission letter comes as EU Member States are preparing for AIFMD II implementation.
In Ireland, the Department of Finance issued a Feedback Statement exercising a number of discretionary provisions provided to Member States under the Level 1 Directive. The Central Bank has also commenced a consultation on a complete overhaul of the Irish private funds regime, proposing a copy-out approach to AIFMD and relaxing a number of its requirements, to align with other EU jurisdictions.
On 3 October, Luxembourg published its draft transposition legislation implementing the AIFMD/UCITS review into national law. According to an initial assessment, the Bill implements the provisions of the AIFMD review on a one-to-one basis, without gold plating and exercises several options provided to Member States under the Level 1 Directive.
Germany published its draft legislation implementing AIFMD/UCITS review on 9 July and has also adopted a copy out approach without any gold plating.