Climate Change
1.Regulations Governing the Collection of Carbon Fees, Regulations for Administration of Voluntary Reduction Plans and Designated Greenhouse Gas Reduction Goal for Entities Subject to Carbon Fees
The Ministry of Environment promulgated the ” Regulations Governing the Collection of Carbon Fees “, ” Regulations for Administration of Voluntary Reduction Plans “, and ” Designated Greenhouse Gas Reduction Goal for Entities Subject to Carbon Fees ” on 29 August 2024. We summarized below:
(1) Carbon Fee Collection Regulations
(a) Definition of carbon fee.
(b) Targets of the carbon fee collection.
(c) Process and deadlines for carbon fee declaration and payment, as well as provisions for deadline extensions.
(d) Calculation methods related to carbon fee and collective emissions, identification of high carbon leakage risks, application of emission adjustment coefficients, and the upper limits and ratios for domestic and international reduction credits, along with the necessary documents for applying for reductions of collective emission.
(e) Overpayment of carbon fee, refunds, supplementary payments, and installment payments.
(f) Carbon fee settlement for closed, suspended, or dissolved businesses.
(g) Regulations on the retention of carbon fee-related data by businesses.
(2) Regulations for Administration of Voluntary Reduction Plans
(a) Application subjects and documents for the voluntary reduction plans, documents required for application, and relevant provisions for joint applications.
(b) The central competent authority will annually audit the progress of the reduction plans, and enterprises shall submit progress reports by the end of April each year. Those who fail to comply with the plan will be required to pay the difference between the regular and preferential rates.
(3) Designated Greenhouse Gas Reduction Goal for Entities Subject to Carbon Fees
To establish two formulas for businesses to choose , which are used to calculate the designated target for the target year.
Reported by: Stacy Lo / Eva Chiu
Trade
2.Draft Amendments to Regulations Governing Inspection of Imported and Exported Goods
On 2 September 2024, the Ministry of Finance announced the draft amendments to the “Regulations Governing Inspection of Imported and Exported Goods”. We summarize below:
(1) The draft amendments change the agencies’ names to correspond to the government’s reformation.
(2) In view of export practices and to avoid exporters’ loss during the inspection process, Article 23 applying to inspection of imported goods 23 will apply mutatis mutandis to inspection of exported goods.
Reported by: Kang-Shen Liu / Sean Tsai
Trust
3.Relaxation of Scope for Online Trust Operations
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) issued a ruling on 28 August 2024 to recognize the suggestion from the Trust Association (TA) of relaxing the scope of online operations for trust services and requested the TA to adopt the relevant regulations into the “Operational Standard for Security Management Control of Electronic Banking Business by Financial Institutions”. We summarize below:
(1) To stipulate that the applicable scope for electronic banking business of financial institutions includes various types of trust account opening (including contract signing), and online amendment or supplement of trust contract is added.
(2) If the usage scope of trust property has been stipulated in the trust contract, the customers can make online application and usage instruction by electronic method, such as account transfers, time deposits, investments, payments, and the exercise of voting rights by beneficiaries.
(3) For “payment instruction for non-designated inward transfer accounts” within the scope of trust property usage under the trust contract, the amount limit is NT$50,000 per transaction, with a daily cumulative limit of NT$100,000 per account and a monthly cumulative limit of NT$200,000 per account. The transaction exceeding the amount limit cannot be conducted by high-risk method.
Reported by: Stacy Lo / Mandy Wu
SITE/SICE
4.Draft Amendments to SITE related Regulations
On September 6, 2024, the FSC announced draft amendments to Article 4-1 of the Regulations Governing Responsible Persons and Associated Persons of Securities Investment Trust Enterprises, Article 19-1 of the Regulations Governing Securities Investment Trust Enterprises, and Article 19-2 of the Regulations Governing the Conduct of Discretionary Investment Business by Securities Investment Trust Enterprises and Securities Investment Consulting Enterprises for public consultation, so as to strengthen the fund manager’s conflict of interest transaction prevention mechanism. We summarize below:
(1) Require that the head of internal audit shall meet certain qualification requirements and hold a position equivalent to vice president or similar position (Article 4-1 of the Regulations Governing Responsible Persons and Associated Persons of Securities Investment Trust Enterprises); and
(2) Upgrade the existing self-disciplined regulations on the management of information and communication equipment of securities investment trust enterprises (SITE) to delegated regulations, so as to further prevent fund managers from engaging in conflict-of-interest transactions, and require the SITE to stipulate conflict-of-interest prevention measures in the internal control system. (Article 19-1 of the Regulations Governing Securities Investment Trust Enterprises and Article 19-2 of the Regulations Governing the Conduct of Discretionary Investment Business by Securities Investment Trust Enterprises and Securities Investment Consulting Enterprises.)
Reported by: Jeffrey Liu / Mandy Wu
5.Regulations on Defects in Master Agents’ Application for Offering and Sale of Offshore Funds in Taiwan or Compliance of Relevant Laws and Regulations announced by the SITCA
On 6 September 2024, the Securities Investment Trust and Consulting Association (SITCA) announced the Regulations on Defects in Master Agents’ Application for Offering and Sale of Offshore Funds in Taiwan or Compliance of Relevant Laws and Regulations (Regulation). The Regulation stipulates that if a master agent submitting an application/report for offshore fund(s) registration fails to meet the eligibility requirements, lacks documents, submits incorrect information, still has deficiencies or errors after supplement, or has not improved the deficiencies of the previous submission with the last two (2) years, the master agent will be penalized with a deficiency point.
If the total number of deficiency points of the master agent reaches fifteen (15) or more, the master agent shall, upon receipt of the notification letter from the SITCA, assign the personnel responsible for the offshore fund application/report to attend the offshore fund regulation related training course held by the SITCA for six (6) hours, and submit an improvement plan for the deficiencies, which has been approved by the general manager and the head of internal audit, to the most recent board of directors’ meeting for report. Failure to comply with the above-mentioned requirements will result in an additional review period for subsequent offshore fund applications/reports.
Reported by: Jeffrey Liu / Amy Su
| Editors: Mike Lu (Partner) Stacy Lo (Partner) Jeffrey Liu (Partner) Kang-Shen Liu (Partner) David Tsai (Partner) Angela Lin (Partner) Paul Hsu (Partner) | Counselors: Echo Yeh Sue Su Jolene Wang (Lexcel Partners IP Firm) |