Michael Tuohy, Partner and Head of Financial Services Audit & Assurance, Forvis Mazars:Over the past 12 months, we’ve seen meaningful steps towards closing the gap in Ireland’s private assets fund ecosystem – though much remains to be done.

On the positive side, the Funds Sector 2030 published by the Department of Finance in October 2024, set out a clear agenda to enhance Ireland’s offering for private-asset fund structures. The review’s recommendations on strengthening the ILP regime and modernising fund-tax provisions were steps in the right direction.

In early October 2025, the Department of Finance published a status update on the Funds 2030 Review. Legislative and regulatory changes to modernisation of the AIF Rulebook are on track for completion in the first half of 2026, while tax measures remain under consideration.

The critical enabler now is speed and clarity of follow-through. This will be essential to closing Ireland’s competitive gap. The core strengths of legal certainty, servicing depth and talent are already in place. Execution is what is needed next.

One year on, Ireland needs to move from aspiration to action. The next 12-18 months will determine how successfully we position ourselves as a leading jurisdiction for managing private asset investments.

Gerry Brady, Independent Non-Executive Director & Consultant: In this era of extreme volatility and uncertainty, coupled with a more benign interest rate environment, the Private Assets sector of the International Investment Funds Industry continues to flourish, as predicted some considerable time ago.

This has generally been acknowledged and there has been a number of positive statements emanating from within our industry. Indeed, it is very positive to note the publication of CP 162, with its proposals for LP-esque style features to be applied to separate share classes for corporate vehicles, and the continued focus on introducing more flexibility for Loan Originating vehicles.

However, the partnership vehicle remains the vehicle of choice for international investors wishing to invest in Private Assets and the lack of action in continuing to update and enhance our partnership legislation, after the enactment of the Investment Limited Partnerships (Amendment) Act 2020, particularly when contrasted with the Luxembourg experience, remains hugely disappointing.

Oisin McClenaghan, Partner, Investment Funds, Ogier: We are currently seeing significant enhancements to our private assets offering being delivered by the Department of Finance and the Central Bank.

The current AIF Rulebook overhaul, which includes enhanced loan origination flexibilities, AIFMD II alignment without any gold plating, substantial additional subsidiary and downstream structures flexibilities, simplification of AIF financing arrangements, greater side-letter flexibility and regulatory streamlining is a significant enhancement to the Irish private assets offering. Coupled with the withholding tax exemption for upstream payments to ILPs contained in the current Finance Bill, any gap is being radically narrowed.