Insights

Over the past number of months, two partners from Grant Thornton Ireland have been putting down roots in the USA, with Brian O’Sullivan heading up the East Coast operations from New York City’s Midtown, and Tony Thornbury handling the West Coast business from his office in San Francisco. We spent some time discussing the recent move with Brian and Tony to learn more about their roles in the market and the rationale behind the decision.

While there has been much discussion of sustainability and ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance) factors in relation to the banking sector in recent times, the reality is that much if not all regulatory instruments to date have focused on a subsection of ‘E’; climate change. Several factors have contributed to this including its actual and predicted impacts, political and social momentum, as well as a growing body of research that facilitates quantification of the associated risks

The Individual Accountability Framework regulation is intended to improve executive accountability within the Irish Financial Services sector by increasing the transparency between Regulated Financial Services Providers (RFSPs) and the Central Bank of Ireland (CBI), particularly of where accountabilities lie in organisations. It follows in the footsteps of similar regimes successfully enacted in the UK, Australia, Singapore, Hong Kong and Malaysia.

The proposed legislation follows on from the reforms proposed in the Central Bank’s report on Behaviour and Culture of the Irish Retail Banks published in 2018, which highlighted the shortcomings in the culture of Irish retail banks. The Central Bank has emphasised that there has been a focus both nationally and internationally since the global financial crisis on “strengthening corporate culture, driving positive behaviour and increasing individual accountability”.

Company registers are official books kept by a company relating to legal and statutory matters. They are also referred to as statutory registers, combined registers or company books.

Effective from 1st August 2022, Commission Delegated Directive (EU) 2021/1270 (“new regulation”) requires all UCITS Management Companies (“UCITS Mancos”) to integrate sustainability risks into the management of UCITS.

In recent years offshore fund investments have become increasingly popular with investors and their brokers. While they can be an attractive alternative to traditional investment options, investors should be aware of additional tax implications and reporting obligations.

Shona O’Hea, our Global Head of Asset Management, talks about one of the challenges facing the Asset Management Industry at the moment being “The Quest for Talent”.

Revenue has published its new Code of Practice for Compliance interventions. The new Code which will be effective from 1 May 2022 sets out their revised framework for interventions from that date and provides for a new graduated response to taxpayer compliance behaviour and also makes significant changes to many of the rules around voluntary disclosure.

At Grant Thornton we meet the challenges of our clients. Our Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) model is tailored for growing multinational companies to support the transition and transformation of finance functions and business growth.

Listen to the latest from our experts in our Asset Management Matters podcast.

The quote ‘change is the only constant’ pre-dates Socrates, to the Greek Philosopher Heraclitus who said ‘you can never enter the same river twice’. This means, somewhere between 535BC and 475BC, we knew that change would be a challenge we would grapple with throughout the course of human existence. So why do organisations still find it so difficult to change?