Société de Gestion de Patrimoine familial, known as SPF, was created by the Law of May 11, 2007 to provide a vehicle dedicated to private wealth management for individuals.
Its sole purpose is to acquire, hold, manage and sell financial assets.
It is not permitted to realize any commercial activity.
The SPF can be considered as the successor of the famous "Holding 29", the Luxembourg holding tax exempt.
It is no longer possible to create new companies under the regime of Holding 29, since this scheme was considered by the European Commission as illegal state of aid.
Existing ¨Holdings 29¨ companies had been protected till 2010, under the grandfather rules, their actions can be transferred only in limited situations.
The SPF regime does not fall within the scope of the state´s aid rules of the EU since its scope is limited, i.e. a passive investment vehicle that is not allowed to participate in economic or commercial activities.
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SPF LEAVE SCOPE OF THE COMMUNITY RULES OF STATE´S AID.
Negotiation between the Government of Luxembourg and the European Commission, which took place in late 2006, concluded that the European Commission shares the view that the SPF is not within the scope of the state´s aid rules.
This initiative has been welcomed by private investors, and their advisors, as this will give legal certainty to the SPF.
• Under all this, investors determined to manage their personal wealth through the new SPF, may now feel safe without fear of being drawn into any possible infringement proceedings regarding State´s aid, as conceived by EU.
SOCIAL PURPOSE AND ACTIVITIES OF SPF
1. ​Exclusive activities.
The purpose of the SPF is limited to the holding acquisition, administration, management and sale of:
a) Financial assets defined in the law of 5 August 2005 about financial collateral (values in the broadest sense, including options, derivatives and structured products, including purchase options of securities, indices and currencies.).
b) Participations in the share capital or voting rights of other companies, but only to the extent that the SPF does not engage in the management of these companies.​
c) Cash (including foreign currencies).
d) Other assets (foe example, precious metals), deposited in an account of a professional provider of financial services.
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2. Excluded activities​.
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The SPF can not perform any of the following activities:
- Such business activities as trade of the financial instruments or financial services (as such, the SPF will be out of reach, as mentioned, of the rules affecting the scope of the EU state´s aid regulations).
- Invest directly in real estate. However, you can buy shares in companies or other not transparent entities containing real estate.​​​
- Participate actively in the management of a company.​
- Any kind of service provision.
- Lending with interest even to subsidiaries.
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3. Exceptions​.
Without prejudice to excluded activities mentioned before in Section 2, the SPF can perform the following activities:
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- Possession of the other companies´ participations (including the majority participations).
- Indirect ownership of real estate through subsidiaries.
- (Up to a certain limit) the granting of advance payments without interest to subsidiaries.