Research On The Protection Of The Right To Know Of Beneficiaries Of Commercial Trusts

In order to reduce the information asymmetry in the management of trust property and safeguard the interests of beneficiaries,China's "Trust Law" clearly stipulates the beneficiary's right to know and the trustee's obligation to provide information.In commercial trusts,trust companies often develop trust products.The professionalism of the trust business makes the secrecy consciousness of trust companies increase,and trade secrets and information disclosure may conflict.In addition,the format of commercial trust contracts and the beneficiaries are mostly individual investors,which reinforces the weak position of beneficiaries' information,and it is difficult to effectively protect the beneficiary's right to know from the perspective of private law.Therefore,a series of regulations and regulations formulated by the China Banking Regulatory Commission.The relevant provisions of the disclosure of trust information are provided in these documents,which impose the statutory obligations to the information disclosure of the trustee of the commercial trust.However,with the break of the “rigid payment” of trusts,cases of beneficiaries claiming information disclosure rights frequently occur in practice.The principle of trust is to maximize the benefits of beneficiaries.Financial consumer protection also requires attention to beneficiaries' right to know.Therefore,based on the legislation and practice of beneficiaries in the commercial trust,this article is based on the legislation and practice of China.From the perspectives of private law and public law,on the one hand,this article discusses the contents and limits,as well as reliefmethods of the “Trust Law” regarding the beneficiary's right to know and the trustee's obligation to provide information.On the other hand,this article analyzes the problems existing in the trust information disclosure from the regulatory level,and put forward suggestions.The first part of this article explains the importance of the protection of the beneficiary's right to know and the particularity of the commercial trust.First of all,based on the core status of the beneficial right of the trust,trust laws in various countries have given the trust beneficiary the right to know,and the trustee is required to provide information,such as reports and instructions.Secondly,from three aspects,it explains the important role played by the beneficiary's right to know: an important way to reduce information asymmetry,ways and preconditions for supervising the behavior of trustees,and the necessary means for exercising the right to relief.Finally,this article analyzes the specificity of the commercial trust,the specialization and organizational characteristics of trustees,the beneficiaries were mostly individual investors and the trust was set up as a financing side,and the trust contract was a formatted contract.These factors intensified the trustee and the Information asymmetry between beneficiaries,it is difficult to fully protect the beneficiaries' interests by relying solely on the right to know of beneficiaries at the private law level.Therefore,China has introduced information disclosure in the supervision of commercial trusts so that the contents and methods of disclosure can be regulated and rely on administrative power to require trustees to perform information disclosure.The second part of this paper considers the boundary of the beneficiary's right to know from the perspective of the private law.Judging from the judicial practice,the specific content contained in the right to know is controversial,such as the details of the transaction related to the trust plan and the details of income distribution,relevant information of other beneficiaries,the situation of the investment object of the trust property,etc.,and it is not difficult to find that it is often difficult for beneficiaries to get relief through litigation.The reason why the beneficiary's right to know is not effectively implemented in practice is the scope of the information is not clearly defined by the legislation.Whether it is the beneficiary's right to know or the fiduciary's obligation to provide information,it should be limited to the information related to the beneficiary's trust property.In other words,the beneficiary does not have the right to know the information that is not related to the trust property of thebeneficiary and the right of the trust enjoyed by the beneficiary.As for whether investment information such as investment decision information,information on different beneficiaries under the same trust plan,and other confidential information needs to be provided,the relationship between the right to know and the protection of trade secrets and trustee confidentiality obligations can be harmonized according to balance of interests and comprehensive considerations.The third part of this paper discusses the supervision rules of trust information disclosure in China from the perspective of public law.China's rules on the disclosure of trust information are scattered in the regulatory department's department regulations and a series of regulatory documents.These documents can be roughly divided into three categories: departmental regulations,operational guidelines or management methods for specific businesses,and regulatory notices for specific matters.In the current practice,the strict supervision of information disclosure of trust products has become a general trend.In recent years,more and more administrative penalties have been imposed on trust companies that are disclosed in violation of regulations.However,there are still regulatory loopholes in information disclosure for trust companies.At the same time,the statutory content requirements for the disclosure of trust information are not uniform,and the arbitrariness of disclosure methods is also obvious.The precondition for perfecting China's trust information disclosure rules is to change the value orientation.It has long been difficult to effectively protect the rights of beneficiaries based on information disclosure rules that meet the needs of regulators,because regulators and beneficiaries have great differences in information needs and understanding capabilities.Therefore,it needs to be clear that the value orientation of disclosure of trust information has been changed to protect the rights of beneficiaries as the core,and on this basis,the trust information disclosure need the combination of mandatory and voluntary nature,the combination of intelligibility and accuracy,and the combination of integrity and conciseness the rules.The fourth part of this paper proposes a legal way to improve the beneficiary's right to know.First of all,from the perspective of private law,we should regulate the exercise of the right to be informed of beneficiaries,introduce "legitimate purpose" conditions in legislation and increase the need of confidentiality of beneficiaries.The question of "legitimate purpose" is mainly the issue of commercial judgment.However,in the legislation,"illegitimate purposes" can be defined through "enumeration + pocket".The confidentiality requirements for beneficiaries can be achieved through prior agreement in the trust contract,signing of confidentiality agreement when requesting,and division of confidentiality authority through the trust registration platform.Second,the rules of disclosure of trust information should be improved from the public law level.On the one hand,we should improve the disclosure rules of the trust in stages,the contents of disclosure in the framework of the unified promotion and issuance phase,the management operation phase,and the termination of the liquidation phase;on the other hand,we should improve the disclosure of disclosure of trust information,using the national trust product registration information system as the main disclosure platform,using the disclosure of the trust company's official website,disclosure of trust company's business premises,e-mail disclosure,and SMS disclosure as a complement.Finally,we should improve the beneficiary's right to know protection mechanism.On the one hand,the civil remedies should be improved on the basis of specific responsibility for breach of contract and tort liability;on the other hand,we should strengthen the administrative accountability for breach of trust information disclosure,supervision must be in place and strict supervision must be in place.