Rowanmoor, the SSAS and SIPP provider, is offering a free Legal Entity Identifier (LEI) registration service for SSAS and Family Pension Trust clients to help with MiFID II compliance.
 
The service is aimed at SSAS and Family Pension Trust trustees, with one or more stockbroking accounts or investment portfolios (including discretionary and execution-only arrangements) in their schemes. 
 
Robert Graves, head of pensions technical services at Embark Group said: “Meeting the LEI requirement is to become an annual administrative requirement and as schemes will have to absorb the cost of registration and renewal, we did not want to add to this further by charging additional fees.” 
 
In a change to the Markets in Financial Instruments Directive (MiFID II), which takes effect from 3 January, all independently registered pension schemes, like small self-administered schemes (SSASs) and Family Pension Trusts will be required to obtain an LEI before trades can take place, says Rowanmoo. 
 
The LEI was introduced globally in response to the financial crisis.  It is a twenty character, alpha-numeric code, which will enable “immediate and accurate” identification of a party to a financial transaction and help to limit market abuse and financial fraud. 
 
Mr Graves, added: “Warnings relating to the impact of MiFID II on SSASs have been widely reported and Rowanmoor is dealing with enquiries from clients and advisers concerned about the financial impact on their schemes and asking what they need to do to comply.”
 
The London Stock Exchange is the only authorised LEI issuing organisation in the UK.  Currently the fee for initial registration with the LSE is £115+VAT.  Once an LEI has been obtained, it must be renewed on an annual basis if trades in reportable financial instruments are required in the future. The current annual renewal fee is £70+VAT. Only one LEI is required per scheme regardless of how many stockbroker accounts or investment portfolios are held as assets of the scheme. 
 
Rowanmoor recently announced it was waiving 100% of Rowanmoor SSAS new scheme and takeover set up fees between 1 October 2017 and 31 March 2018.