Investment certificate
The investment certificate (also fund share , fund share certificate , fund certificate , investment unit , investment share certificate , mutual fund share or mutual fund share certificate ) is a value paper , which as a unit certificate his owner a co-ownership on fund an investment funds securitized .
General
Alongside stocks , bonds and savings books, investment certificates are the most important securitized financial instruments for investing . While with shares of shareholders direct participation rights has and an entrepreneurial risk bears who takes investors on bonds a creditor function when obligor and assumes a credit risk . Investment certificates are characterized by the fact that, like shares, they embody a right of co-ownership, which does not apply to a company , but to a special fund that is diversified according to asset and risk classes . The investment fund is formed by a capital management company and managed by it on a fiduciary basis ( Section 17 (1) KAGB ).
The hedge fund certificates do not belong to the investment certificates ; In terms of securities law, they are designed as bearer bonds or index certificates .
Legal issues
According to Section 2 (33) of the WpHG , the certificate is a security that can be traded on the capital market and that, in the event of repayment made by the issuer , has priority over shares but is subordinate to unsecured bonds and other comparable financial instruments. In the Capital Investment Code (KAGB), investment certificates are simply called "shares". The units in special funds are evidenced in unit certificates in accordance with Section 95 (1) KAGB. The right of co-ownership is divided into fractions of the fund. In accordance with Section 1 (10) of the KAGB, special funds are open domestic investment funds in contract form that are managed by an investment company for the account of the investors. The fund is specially protected by law, so that the issuer risk is essentially eliminated. Since the investment funds represent the result of a legally prescribed risk diversification of different asset classes (cf. § 214 KAGB, § 243 KAGB), the volatility of the certificate prices is lower than that of the individual underlyings in the investment fund .
In accordance with Section 95 (1) KAGB, the unit certificates can be made out to the bearer (in which case they belong to the bearer papers ) or in names (in which case they are order papers ). Bearer papers are transferred by real agreement and handover , order papers require an endorsement . If they are made out to the holder, they must be securitized in a global document and the right to individual securitization is excluded; if they are made out in their name, § 67 AktG and § 68 AktG apply accordingly. Collective safekeeping is mandatory for bearer certificates, and blanket endorsement is required for collective safekeeping of name certificates ( Section 97 (1) KAGB). In accordance with Section 96 (1) KAGB, the investment certificates can be subdivided according to various design features, in particular with regard to the use of income, the issue surcharge, the redemption fee, the currency of the unit value, the management fee, the minimum investment amount or a combination of these characteristics (unit classes ). If a share certificate has lost or destroyed, then the certificate if the contrary is determined is the array method for declared powerless (§ 97 para. 2 KAGB).
Every investor can request at least twice a month that his share in the investment fund is paid out to him in return for the return of the share ( Section 98 (1) KAGB), unless there are exceptional circumstances that would require the return to be suspended, taking into account the Make the interests of the investors appear necessary (Section 98 (2) KAGB).
Price determination
The prices of the investment certificates are determined every trading day by the respective depositary and published by the capital management company. There are three prices, namely the issue price , the unit price and the redemption price . The unit price is calculated from the net asset value of the investment fund divided by the number of units issued.
If units are sold by a fund company, this is done at the issue price, which is made up of the unit price and an issue surcharge. The maximum front-end load ( premium ) is specified in the investment conditions (pursuant to Section 165 (2) No. 8 KAGB and Section 71 (2) KAGB). The price for the redemption of units or shares (redemption price) must correspond to the net asset value of the unit or share in the domestic investment fund minus a discount to be determined in the investment conditions in accordance with Section 165 (2) No. 8 KAGB.
With the idea to bypass the often high sales charges of the fund companies and their distribution partners, launched in 2002, the stock exchange fund trading on the Hamburg Stock Exchange . Since then, it has been expanded to include a growing number of products. In the course of a trading day, various prices can arise from supply and demand that differ from the share price published by the fund company.
Tax law
Pursuant to Section 4 (4) BewG , units that certify rights to an investment fund within the meaning of the KAGB are to be assessed at the redemption price for tax purposes .
In accordance with Section 2 (4) InvStG, the investment certificate is the share in an investment fund, regardless of the legal structure of the share or the investment fund. The “legal form” of the share is the form of bearer or order paper, the design of the investment fund means its legal form as a stock corporation or limited partnership .
statistics
The three most important types of securities recorded the following sales figures:
| Security type | Sales January – March 2018 in billions of euros |
Sales January – March 2019 in billions of euros |
|---|---|---|
| Bearer bonds | 44.6 | 77.0 |
| shares | 26.7 | 3.3 |
| Investment certificates | 43.0 | 33.7 |
Despite the low interest rates , bonds continue to dominate, followed by investment certificates.
Individual evidence
- ↑ How is the unit price of an investment fund calculated? . Union Investment
- ↑ Trading funds on the stock exchange - do private investors benefit? In: ECOreporter. February 8, 2018, accessed on March 25, 2020 : "Exchange-based fund trading in Germany is an innovation of the Hamburg Stock Exchange from 2002"
- ↑ Deutsche Bundesbank , Net Sales and Acquisition of Securities in Germany , May 13, 2019, Annex
