Malta’s single-family office offering: The NPIF as an EU platform for private wealth structuring

As high-net-worth families seek stable and flexible jurisdictions for managing private wealth, Malta continues to strengthen its Single-Family Office (“SFO”) offering.

The Notified Professional Investor Fund (“NPIF”) SFO framework provides an efficient route to establish a recognised fund structure for pooling and managing family wealth, within a proportionate regulatory environment.

The NPIF¹ is a notification-based collective investment scheme that does not require full Malta Financial Services Authority’s (“MFSA”) authorisation, enabling a faster route to market while remaining subject to defined requirements.

For SFOs, it offers a practical and flexible platform to pool, manage, and govern private family wealth within a recognised fund structure, accommodating diverse asset allocations and long-term investment strategies within regulatory parameters.

The recent regulatory amendments² further enhanced the regime by extending the NPIF SFO to be self-managed. The updated framework also introduced operational simplifications for self-managed NPIF SFOs, including relief from the requirement to establish an investment committee. These changes reflect a proportionate regulatory approach, recognising the private nature of SFO structures while maintaining appropriate safeguards.

These amendments are commercially significant, aligning the NPIF more closely with how family offices operate in practice. For high-net-worth families, the NPIF SFO regime offers: a recognised EU-based fund structure, a fast time-to-market of 10 working days, and flexibility in investment strategy and governance.

The regime is designed for sophisticated private wealth structures and is subject to eligibility thresholds, including a minimum investment of €5 million and over €50 million in aggregate family office assets (or their currency equivalents).

KPMG in Malta can support families in assessing whether the NPIF SFO structure is suitable for their objectives.

Our teams assist across the full structuring lifecycle, including feasibility assessments, regulatory analysis, structuring, tax considerations, governance design, operational implementation, and ongoing compliance.