New account, profile and filing processes for investment funds

SEDAR+ represents a significant process change for all securities regulatory filings in Canada—particularly for investment funds. If you are an Investment Fund Manager (IFM), you will immediately notice the differences. As with all new technology, it may take a while to adjust; but once you have gained familiarity with the new system, we are confident you will appreciate the new features.  

New setup for accounts and profiles 

One of the biggest changes IFMs will find in SEDAR+ is the set-up and management of accounts and profiles. Currently in SEDAR, IFMs have an Investment Fund Group (IFG) profile for each prospectus project. 

In SEDAR+, IFMs who elect to do their own filings must register for a SEDAR+ account. The SEDAR+ Help Centre will have details on how to register for your SEDAR+ account. If you use a filing agent to submit filings, they will initiate this on your behalf.  

A profile for the IFM will be created as a Company or Third-party organization, with IFM selected as the issuer role.  For those IFM’s that completed early onboarding, your profile will be linked to your migrated IFG profiles and associated funds.  For those onboarding after go-live, first you will create your IFM profile and then you will need to link to your migrated IFG profiles and associated funds.  Going forward, IFMs or their filing agent(s) will then set up independent profiles for each of their new fund group profiles, which can then be linked to this IFM profile. Fund profiles are linked to the fund group profile, just as they are currently in SEDAR. New for SEDAR+ is the addition of the classes/series offered via the prospectus that must be added to the fund group profile.  

Once the information is in SEDAR+, IFMs will have greater flexibility to make changes to their fund portfolio. We recognize that setting up each investment fund group profile and entering all relevant details will take considerable time upfront, but please keep in mind that this one-time process will benefit investment funds, regulators and their investors in the long run (see below for examples).    

It’s that old saying, “short-term pain for long-term gain”. 


More flexibility to manage investment funds

SEDAR+ has many new features for IFMs that are not currently available in SEDAR. In SEDAR+ you will be able to: 

  1. Update information on the IFM company or third party-organization profile that will automatically update the same fields on the linked group and fund profiles (e.g., address details) 
  2. See updates that are made to classes/series at the time of submitting a prospectus reflected on the group profile for future prospectus filing’s reference 
  3. Add and manage authorized users, permissions and passwords directly online, thus bypassing the need to go through the CSA Service Desk. Watch our recent information session for Authorized Super Users (ASUs) to learn more.  

WATCH a series of step-by-step videos that walk you through the changes you can expect beginning June 13:  

Automated filing fee calculations under a single SEDAR+ account

Filing fee payments are simplified with a single pre-authorized debit (PAD) account per SEDAR+ account. This single account is used for payment (via EFT) at the time of submitting all investment fund filings. 

Additionally, you’ll be sent a payment receipt and will be able to download a summary of filing payments to reconcile bank accounts and identify payment issues, outstanding fees, and refunds.  

A better experience for your investors

More robust search options and filters mean less scrolling through long lists of documents, allowing your investors to narrow their search results. On SEDAR+, investors will be able to search by document name and by document content to access the specific fund information they are looking for.  

Start gathering account and profile information now

If your organization did not participate in the pre-launch Onboarding process, you will register for a new SEDAR+ account when the new system launches on June 13. 

We encourage IFMs and their teams to start gathering the information needed to complete the required legal documents and profile setup so you’re ready to get started with your new SEDAR+ account when the system goes live.  

May 2023 – Information provided is accurate at time of publication.