Peter R. Leenders
Partner with Brands Advocaten (the Netherlands)
Banking & Securities Law
E: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
T: +31 26 405 2085
F: +31 26 442 3977
Peter Leenders is specialised in the Dutch legal regulatory framework for the financial industry, and is regularly involved in matters related to regulated and non-regulated investment funds, private equity funds, securities brokers, portfolio managers and banks (including finance companies). Peter has specific experience and expertise in structuring of various types of domestic and internationally operating funds including foreign UCITS’s and - to the extent required - licensing and registration of these with the Authority for the Financial Markets (AFM), the competent supervisory authority in respect of investment funds. Structuring and licensing of securities brokers and portfolio managers and in assisting such brokers and managers in their contacts with the AFM, which is also the competent supervisory authority in respect of securities institutions, also forms part of his practice.
Peter has furthermore been involved in advising several portfolio managers, pension funds and insurance companies in the (re)structuring of their asset management activities, various (international) debt issuance programmes, issuance of equity and debt instruments by corporates, the set up of private equity and capital venture structures and in various international projects related to the offering of financial services through the Internet, and has been seconded for several months with the Dutch Central Bank (at that time the sole competent supervisory authority in the investment fund industry) at the department that supervised the Dutch investment industry.
Peter is regularly asked by clients for the drafting and issuing of legal opinions, and litigates in the area of banking and securities law.
The advisory projects and transactions where Peter was recently involved include amongst others:
- Structuring a private investment fund that indirectly invests - through a profit participating loan granted to a subholding - in a major Dutch real estate development company that until recently formed part of a conglomerate that was listed at the Amsterdam Stock Exchange, including the drafting of the profit participating loan
- Structuring of fund in fund structures and drafting of the documentation required for the funds including prospectus and limited partnership agreements and advice on the regulatory aspects of the offering to the public of the participation rights in such structures
- Structuring of umbrella investment funds, including an umbrella fund in the form of a legal fund without legal personality and the creation of the necessary flexible framework for the introduction of new sub-funds with different portfolio compositions and portfolio management techniques. The first sub-fund invests in index and equity derivatives in order to optimize the performance with a view of exceeding the development of the DowJones EURO STOXX 50 Index. The second sub fund invests in blue chip equities and derivatives on such equity stock
- Structuring of (non-regulated) private equity funds, based in the Netherlands as well as abroad
- Assisting investors in the process of investing in private equity funds (legal due diligence)
- Structuring of a (non-regulated) hedge fund
- Structuring and licensing of a number of real-estate investment institutions in various legal forms, regulated as well as non-regulated funds
- Listing of a real-estate investment fund at the Amsterdam Stock Exchange
- Advising a Dutch major portfolio manager on various compliance issues
- Advising a pension fund in the restructuring of its asset management activities
- Setting up an Internet platform that facilitates the trade in investment funds, including licensing of the operator of the platform with the AFM as a securities broker, drafting agreements to be entered into with clients of the platform and ancillary documentation, arranging for financing documentation and advising on several compliance issues
- Advising Antillian investment funds that run the risk to loose their fiscal status due to change in policy of the AFM
- Assisting a foreign bank/broker in establishing a branch in the Netherlands
- Advising a mortgage loan provider with regard to amendments in legislation.
Education and professional career:
- University of Nijmegen (Radboud Universiteit)
- Postgraduate education in Securities Law at the Grotius Academy
- Legal counsel with Alexander Robin Groep B.V. (insurance underwriter)
- Attorney at law with Andersen Legal
- Legal counsel with PricewaterhouseCoopers N.V.
- Attorney at law with Steins Bisschop Meijburg & Co Advocaten (partner)
- Attorney at law with Faasen & Partners Advocaten (Eversheds Faasen) (partner).
Languages:
Peter speaks Dutch and English.