In an 11th hour move, the CFTC and SEC both announced that they will be pushing back the compliance dates for Gensler-era amendments to Form PF. The new deadline is now October 1, 2025. The delay comes in response to concerns from private funds about implementing some of the amendments’ highly technical requirements.

Both agencies previously agreed to move the effective compliance date of the amendments to June 12, 2025, an extension from the original March 12, 2025, deadline.

While the second delay comes as a welcome concession to most industry participants, it is less than the full year of additional time some industry groups had requested.

Changes to Form PF

The Form PF amendments, which were jointly adopted by the SEC and CFTC in February 2024, expanded the mandatory disclosure scope of the 2011 confidential reporting form to enhance the ability of the Financial Stability Oversight Council (FSOC) to monitor and assess systemic risk at private funds.

The Form PF amendments required that private fund advisers registered with the SEC and CFTC report on the following areas:

• investment exposures;
• borrowing and counterparty exposure;
• currency, country and industry exposure;
• risk metrics;
• investment performance by strategy; and
• portfolio, financing and investor liquidity.

The amendments further require more detailed information about the investment strategies, counterparty exposures, and trading and clearing mechanisms employed by hedge funds. They will also require private fund advisers to report on personally identifying information, assets under management, withdrawal and redemption rights, gross asset value and net asset value, and beneficial ownership.

Industry concern about the time scale of implementing the new requirements was apparent from the beginning. The Managed Funds Association (MFA), which requested a year’s delay of the compliance deadline beyond the initial three month pause, noted that firms faced burdensome system overhauls to meet new data requirements.

It also noted that that process had been made more difficult by updates to reporting schemas and guidance that the CFTC, SEC, and FINRA made after the first pause was granted.

Commissioners weigh in

Commissioner Hester Peirce, who previously dissented against the adoption of the amendments, wrote in a statement that “the new form is not ready for prime time. The extension reflects a commitment to good governance and common-sense implementation,” reflecting similar views from SEC Commissioner Uyeda, and Chair Atkins.

She also described Form PF’s expanded reporting requirements as “overly extensive,” and said she supported a deeper review of whether the amendments serve their intended purpose of mitigating risk.

Conversely, SEC Commissioner Caroline Crenshaw described the delay as a “last minute request” from sophisticated financial entities who lacked a credible reason for doing so.

She claimed that undermining the Form PF amendments was would hobble “our and other financial regulators’ ability to conduct more precise and effective analysis of private markets,” during a regulatory push to make them more accessible to retail investors.

She also claimed her agency was disregarding the Administrative Procedure Act by implementing two delays without notice-and-comment rulemaking.

Kristin N Johnson, the CFTC’s lone Democratic commissioner, evinced unspecified “grave concerns” about implementing a second Form PF compliance delay.

Despite those reservations, she voted to confirm the compliance pause, citing the importance of bipartisanship, echoing statements by incoming CFTC chair Brian Quintenz.

“I am hopeful that the Commissions leadership’s commitments to democratic processes continue to prevail and our regulation continues to protect investors, encourage market integrity and stability, and foster and promote the deepest, most liquid markets in the world,” she said.