The first product the company plans to offer advisers and their clients will be a QROPS-based product, which it's calling the Momentum Gibraltar Pension Plan. This product will be in keeping with similar products Momentum markets out of its Maltese and Isle of Man facilities, and like them, will be available in both a "Lite" and "Plus" charging structure, according to John Batty, group intermediary partnership director.
As reported, Gibraltar's Government is currently consulting its pensions and trusts industries on new regulations that are understood to be aimed at tightening up on the way qualifying recognised overseas pension schemes (QROPS) are set up and run in the British overseas territory, with a goal of ensuring that the key elements of any Gibraltar scheme administrator were based in Gibraltar and not “outsourced”.
Batty said that Momentum had addressed these concerns over the more than seven months it had been working on its application and other plans, in preparation for the Gibraltar launch.
"The Gibraltar operation will be a separate company, based in Gibraltar, with a Gibraltar staff," he said, adding that a licence had been issued to Momentum by the Financial Services Commission (GFSC), and that the company expected to be able to begin taking pension transfers "once formal acknowledgement has been received from HM Revenue & Customs" that the new pension plan has been established and meets HMRC's QROPS requirements.
Currently there are some 33 Gibraltar QROP schemes listed on HM Revenue & Customs' online list, which is more than three times as many as Gib had around two years ago.
Identical terms
According to Momentum chief executive Stewart Davies, the terms under which Momentum will market its Gibraltar pension products will be identical to those it offers in its other jurisdictions. It also will permit clients to switch their pensions between any of Momentum's products, within all three of its jurisdictions, without incurring charges, Davies said.
He added that Momentum remained "committed" to giving advisers and clients a choice of products and jurisdictions, rather than trying to fit everyone into a single "one-size-fits-all" product.
Momentum decided to introduce a Gibraltar option, Davies added, in response to adviser demand.
Davies, who succeeded Mark Gaywood as group chief executive in January, said he and his Momentum colleagues had been "impressed" by the thoroughness of the Gibraltar regulator and "their commitment to having a robust, Gibraltar based [pension] operation".
Transfers resumed in 2012
The business of administering QROPS has taken off in Gibraltar since 2012. That was the year that the jurisdiction’s pension fund trustees resumed pension transfers from the UK to the Rock, after voluntarily suspending them for almost three years, pending resolution of what were understood to be concerns by HM Revenue & Customs over how the jurisdiction taxed pensions.
As reported here earlier this month, the Gibraltar Government is in the process of amending its income tax legislation to enable QNUPS structures to be set up for the first time in the British overseas territory.
