The AMF Enforcement Committee has fined an asset management company and two of its directors for breaches of their professional obligations and cleared two other directors
Executive Summary
The AMF found that Uzès Gestion failed in several core control areas: conflicts of interest identification, continuity of human resources, remuneration compliance, investor communication, AML/CFT reporting accuracy, marketing fairness, and valuation governance. The Committee also rejected one of the Board’s more serious allegations—failure to comply with authorisation conditions—because the impugned acts were isolated, limited, and tied to the group’s operating structure, not proof of a systematic breach. #
What Changed
- - The AMF’s decision reinforces that asset managers must maintain continuous compliance with their authorisation conditions, but isolated overreach by a person not listed as an executive officer was not enough, on these facts, to prove a breach of au
- Firms must have procedures that identify and manage conflicts of interest, including conflicts arising from links with a parent company and from the overlapping functions of directors and financial managers.
- Asset managers must ensure continuity of human resources and align remuneration practices for financial managers with the applicable regulations, the approved programme of activity, and internal procedures.
- Firms must disclose to investors management-fee retrocessions paid to distributors and must be able to justify any claimed enhancement of the service provided.
- Information provided to investors and prospects must be clear, accurate, and not misleading, including in marketing materials.
- AML/CFT reporting submitted to the AMF must be accurate; erroneous information in regulatory reports can itself support enforcement action.
Suggested Considerations
- Review the firm’s authorisation file, governance map, and executive-officer appointments to confirm that actual decision-making powers match the AMF-approved organisational structure.
- Update conflicts-of-interest procedures to capture conflicts arising from parent-company relationships, cross-directorships, and shared finance leadership roles.
- Test whether staffing levels and succession arrangements ensure continuity of human resources for control functions and key operational roles.
- Reassess remuneration arrangements for financial managers to verify consistency with the firm’s programme of activity, internal procedures, and regulatory requirements.
- Verify that all distributor retrocessions are fully disclosed to investors and that any claim of enhanced service is documented with evidence.
- Remediate all investor and prospect marketing templates so that disclosures are clear, accurate, complete, and not misleading.
Key Dates
Compliance Impact
The sanction is significant because it combines firm-level penalties with individual warnings and fines, signalling that the AMF will pursue both organisational failures and management accountability. For non-compliance, the likely consequences include monetary sanctions, reputational damage, supervisory scrutiny, and greater risk of follow-on remediation demands.
Who is Affected
References
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Summary
Sanctions & settlements professional obligations Journalists Investment management companies The AMF Enforcement Committee has fined an asset management company and two of its directors for breaches of their professional obligations and cleared two other directors