I. Introduction
Law No. 7596 on Certain Investment Funds Ordered into Liquidation, published in the Official Gazette of 27 October 2026 (issue 33413), is the first legislation on payments to investors who have been unable to reach their money since the fund crisis of September 2026. It governs how payments are calculated in the funds that the Capital Markets Board (SPK) ordered into liquidation on 17 September 2026, how assets unlawfully taken out of those funds are recovered and how fund losses are collected from those responsible. On the same day, by decision 76/1903, the SPK set out in which funds, in what order and within what limits interim payments will be made before the liquidation is completed.
II. How Payments Are Calculated and the Interim Payment Mechanism
Net Investment
For investors, the most important provision of the Law concerns how the money raised in the liquidation will be shared out. If the cash raised from selling a fund’s assets does not cover the total value of all units at the closing price on 16 September 2026, the day before the liquidation decision, payments will take into account, instead of that value, each investor’s net investment calculated by the method the Law sets out. Under that method, the cash outflows paid to the investor from the fund are deducted from the investor’s cash inflows into the fund, and the remainder is uprated for inflation to the liquidation date.
The Central Registry Agency (MKK) will calculate net investment and pass it to the liquidating banks. Which inflow each outflow is deducted from becomes clear from the example in the preamble to the bill. According to the preamble, each cash outflow is deducted starting from the oldest cash inflow, and the inflows that remain are uprated from the date each was made to the liquidation date. Under the Law, the uprating uses the average change in the consumer and domestic producer price indices, applied day by day. An investor with units in several funds will have a separate net investment figure in each. It should be stressed, however, that net investment is not a guaranteed claim. It is the yardstick for sharing out the available money in funds where the cash falls short, and what the investor receives is limited by the fund’s cash.
The Interim Payment Mechanism
So that investors can be paid without waiting for the liquidation to end, the Law also provides for interim payments. It gives the SPK the power to designate the funds in which they are made, and by decision 76/1903 the SPK provided for interim payments in the funds in liquidation founded by Tera, Pusula and Atlas portfolio management companies. İş Bankası will make the payments in the Tera funds and Ziraat Bankası in the Pusula and Atlas funds. Funds with enough cash to pay everyone at the closing price on 16 September 2026 will make no interim payment and will go straight to a final payment.
In funds where interim payments are made, the ceiling on the payment to each investor is, as a rule, their unindexed net investment. In no case, however, can an interim payment exceed TRY 1 million. An investor whose unindexed net investment is TRY 300,000 can therefore receive at most TRY 300,000, and one whose unindexed net investment is TRY 1.5 million at most TRY 1 million.
If the cash raised from a fund is not enough to cover all interim payments calculated in this way, the Law provides for an exceptional procedure. Under the SPK decision, investors may then be ranked for payment starting with the lowest interim payment, and the SPK may also approve payments to all investors up to a specified minimum amount, either alongside that ranking or separately. The ceilings above continue to apply under this procedure, and in every fund the value of the investor’s units also limits the payment.
An investor who receives an interim payment keeps their units, which are returned only on final payment. The final payment will deduct what the investor has already received from the liquidation assets or from the recovery account described below, together with payments received outside the liquidation, through other legal routes such as litigation or enforcement, for rights and claims in the same fund.
III. Money Market Funds and Other Funds Compared
The order and amount of interim payments differ depending on whether the investor’s units are in a money market fund. The distinction determines both which funds are paid first and whether the value of the investor’s units limits the interim payment.
Money Market Funds
Under the SPK decision, interim payments start with funds whose title includes "money market". In these funds the ceiling on the interim payment is set only under the rule described above. Even if the value of the investor’s units has fallen below their net investment, the interim payment can be made within the net investment and TRY 1 million limits.
Under the exceptional procedure for funds whose cash cannot cover all interim payments, however, the value of the units limits the payment in money market funds as well. In that case the units are valued at the end of 16 September 2026, the day before the liquidation decision.
Hedge Funds and Other Funds
In funds other than money market funds, such as hedge funds (serbest fonlar) and equity funds, an interim payment can exceed neither the amount found under the rule above nor the value of the units in the investor’s account. That value will be set by Takasbank as at the end of the day before the interim payment is calculated, through a valuation based on information from the liquidating bank. For example, an investor whose unindexed net investment is TRY 400,000 but whose units have fallen in value to TRY 250,000 because the fund’s assets have lost value can receive an interim payment of at most TRY 250,000 in these funds.
These funds will also be paid after money market funds, and among them, funds whose cash covers a larger share of their interim payment obligations will come first. Under the exceptional procedure for funds whose cash falls short, the value of the units is taken on the same date.
IV. The Recovery Account
The Law does not limit what investors receive to the assets still in the funds. As assets unlawfully taken out of a fund are recovered and losses are collected from those responsible, the proceeds will be transferred to the fund or to the recovery account, where amounts are tracked separately for each fund. Those proceeds, together with amounts lawfully recovered from assets seized in criminal investigations, may be used only for that fund’s liquidation and payments to its investors. The portfolio management company will be liable for the loss first. The individuals and legal entities the SPK identifies as responsible, and those found to have acted with them, will be personally liable for amounts that cannot be collected from the company or for which it is already clear that collection will be impossible, and following notification by the SPK the Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF) will pursue those amounts under the procedures for collecting public receivables. While the liquidation continues, the money goes to the liquidating bank, and once it has ended, the Investor Compensation Center pays it to unit holders pro rata. The Law imposes no repayment obligation on investors who made a profit by selling their units before the liquidation. They may, if they choose, pay any gain above the inflation-adjusted amount of their cash inflows into accounts the SPK will announce, and those amounts will also go into the recovery account.
V. Unexecuted Orders, Excluded Persons and Time Limits
The Law also deals with investors who gave sell orders on the Turkish Electronic Fund Trading Platform (TEFAS) before the liquidation decision but whose orders were never executed. Where an order was sent to TEFAS on or before 17 September 2026 but could not be executed because the fund defaulted or no unit price was published, investors whose units have been blocked will be subject to the liquidation rules as unit holders. Their holdings will be determined per fund and per account once the liquidating bank has reconciled its records with the MKK, and the same net investment calculation and distribution rules will apply to them as to other unit holders.
In this the Law departs from the procedure in the SPK’s Bulletin 2026/61, under which amounts arising from unexecuted sell orders were to be booked as a debt of the fund and paid first. Investors whose orders were not executed will therefore take part in the liquidation as unit holders, not as creditors of the fund, and will not be paid ahead of other unit holders.
The Law excludes certain persons and entities from payments altogether. No payment from the liquidation or the recovery account will be made to persons and entities the SPK finds to have committed market abuse, insider dealing or market fraud under Articles 104, 106 or 107 of the Capital Markets Law through or together with these funds, or to have acted together with those who did.
The Law sets no new application or filing deadline for investors and does not suspend existing ones. Time limits for remedies such as a full remedy action against the SPK or, where its conditions are met, a damages claim against a distributing bank therefore continue to run under the laws that govern them. However, by its decision of 26 October 2026, published in Bulletin 2026/75, the SPK temporarily suspended the activities of the Tera and Pusula portfolio management companies under Article 97(1) of the Capital Markets Law. Under Article 97(3), until the companies are allowed to resume their activities, their assets cannot be attached or made subject to interim injunctions, enforcement and bankruptcy proceedings against them stop automatically, and limitation and time-bar periods against them that an enforcement step could interrupt do not run.
VI. Conclusion
Investors holding units in a covered fund should check their fund and account records, any blocking of an unexecuted order, and the net investment and interim payment figures that the MKK will calculate and pass to the liquidating bank. Because the amount and timing of payments depend on each fund’s cash, the payment rules in force and further SPK decisions, it would also be advisable to follow announcements from the SPK and the liquidating banks and to keep track of the time limits for other remedies without waiting for the liquidation to end.
