In data 29 marzo 2021, l'"European Securities and Markets Authority" (l'"ESMA") ha aggiornato le "questions and answers on MiFID II and MiFIR investor protection and intermediaries topics" (ESMA35-43-349) (le "Q&A") al fine di fornire maggiori chiarimenti e indicazioni in materia di "incentivi".
In particolare, le Q&A contengono ora una nuova "question and answer" (cfr. paragrafo 12, "question and answer" n. 8) relativa alle condizioni che specificano quando un incentivo può essere considerato concepito per migliorare la qualità del servizio prestato al cliente.
A tal riguardo, la nuova "question and answer" fornisce indicazioni sull'applicazione di tre importanti elementi contenuti nell’articolo 11, paragrafo 2, lettera a), della Direttiva (UE) 2017/593, in particolare la condizione che l'incentivo sia giustificato:
(i) dalla prestazione di un servizio aggiuntivo o di livello superiore (1);
(ii) dal fatto che il servizio di cui al punto sub (i) sia indirizzato al relativo cliente (2);
(iii) della proporzionalità del servizio di cui al punto sub (i) al livello di incentivi ricevuti (3).
In ogni caso, l'ESMA specifica che tali elementi si applicano congiuntamente alle altre condizioni previste nell’articolo 11, paragrafo 2, della Direttiva (UE) 2017/593, ivi inclusa la previsione secondo cui l'incentivo "è considerato inaccettabile qualora la prestazione dei servizi pertinenti al cliente sia falsata o distorta a causa dell'onorario, della commissione o del beneficio non monetario".
(1) A tal proposito, l'ESMA specifica che "the reference to ‘additional’ or ‘higher level’ requires that the quality enhancement provided should go beyond aspects of the firm’s organisation or services that are legally required or that can be considered as essential for its functioning. […] For instance, the provision of non-independent advice on and access to a wide range of suitable financial instruments, including an appropriate number of instruments from non-affiliated third-party providers, can be considered as an ‘additional’ or ‘higher level’ service because a firm providing non-independent advice is not otherwise legally required to assess a sufficient range of instruments from different providers. […] Regarding essential aspects of the firm’s organisation or service, which therefore should not be considered as ‘additional’ or higher level’, examples would be common call-centres or general publicly available websites. ESMA considers that aspects such as these should not qualify as ‘additional’ or ‘higher level’ since the firm’s organisation or service cannot do without these aspects".
(2) A tal riguardo, l'ESMA specifica che "services that can be considered as ‘additional’ or ‘higher level’ in theory, could still not be a quality enhancement for the client in question. Therefore, the ‘additional’ or ‘higher-level’ service should be provided to the relevant client. For instance, the provision of advice about the suggested optimal asset allocation of the client, not relating to specific financial instruments but to asset classes in general, might not always be relevant for clients receiving the services of reception and transmission and/or execution of orders without investment advice that prefer taking their own investment decisions. Equally, value-added tools to help clients take investment decisions that in theory might be considered as ‘additional’ or ‘higher level’, might not always be relevant for clients receiving investment advice that prefer relying on the investment advice provided by the firm to take their investment decisions with no need to use any additional tool. […] ESMA considers, as a good practice, that the quality enhancement can also be provided to a relevant segment of clients, provided that this segment is sufficiently homogeneous, i.e. the quality enhancements provided should be relevant for all clients that belong to this segment. When defining these client segments, factors to take into account include for example the investment or ancillary service provided, the distribution channel used, and the level of inducements received in connection with the service provided to the client. Importantly, a firm that provides different investment services and has different client segments should differentiate the quality enhancements according to the different client segments in its inducements policy".
(3) "The third element is proportionality. Services that can be considered as ‘additional’ or ‘higher-level’, and that are provided to the relevant client, should not be regarded as a quality enhancement if the value-added is not proportional to the level of inducements received. It is important to underline that it is the level of inducements received by the firm that is of relevance, not the client’s investment amount. ESMA emphasises that this is equally relevant for the examples given in Article 11(2)(a) of the MiFID II Delegated Directive, firms should thus always assess the proportionality of the inducements received".
Authors: Luca Lo Pò è Claudio Saba.
