The Regulation and Governance of Mutual Funds in the UK in the Quest for Investor Protection: Lessons for Middle Eastern Countries

The mutual funds regulation in Middle Eastern countries is still insufficient and lacks the detailed rules that regulate all aspects of the mutual funds industry. Despite the fact that the current mutual fund regulation addresses different aspects of the fund industry, it is still far from the international standards applied in many countries such as the UK and the USA. The main purpose of this thesis is to investigate the possibility of exporting certain essential regulatory rules form the mutual funds regulation in the UK to the mutual funds regulation in Middle Eastern countries in order to enhance investors’ protection. Enhancing the mutual funds regulations generally and investors protection particularly would accelerate the development of the mutual funds industry in those countries. The first chapter of the thesis is an introduction. The second chapter defines mutual funds by showing their significant role in the financial market and showing their unique attributes which differentiate them from other financial institutions. The third chapter scrutinises the existing mutual funds laws and regulations and their amendments in the UK, namely the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000, the Open Ended Investments Companies Regulations 2001 and the Financial Conduct Authority Sourcebook. The fourth chapter examines the governance of mutual funds under the current legal framework in the UK. The fifth chapter focuses on how the features discussed in the previous chapters could be used in Middle Eastern countries. Finally, chapter six provides the general conclusion of the thesis and the contribution of this research. The findings from the research show that the unique nature of mutual funds as useful financial institutions comes from the combination of the advantages offered to the investors by one financial institution. They also illustrate that mutual funds in the UK are governed by a robust legal framework that regulates nearly all aspects of the industry in detail. This legal framework adopts efficient governance mechanisms that provide investors with a high level of protection. The governance mechanisms ensure investors protection and play a key role in mitigating the potential conflicts of interests between the self-interests of the fund management and the interests of the investors. Another important finding of the research is that the current mutual funds regulations in Middle Eastern countries lack the detailed rules, and they do not regulate all aspects of the fund industry. Therefore, mutual funds investors are not well protected. Finally, the research shows that certain regulatory rules form the UK regulations are exportable to Syrian Mutual funds regulations and can be exportable to Middle Eastern countries. These rules will increase investors’ protection and fill the gap between the international standard and those applied in Middle Eastern countries