Pension Business Investment in French Equities

In 2012 and in response to the decision of the European Court of Justice in the case of FIM Santander c-338/11 the French government abolished withholding tax on dividends paid to certain foreign collective investment vehicles including UCITs.  For more on the change in French law this seems a good link.
http://www.clearstream.com/ci/dispatch/en/cic/CIC/Annnouncements/ICSD/Tax/France/A12155.htm

There are some complications around this.  Firstly the French authorities have not released any details on how UCITs and similar funds can obtain the 0% rate.  Secondly France currently withholds tax at 15% on dividends paid to pension schemes.  There is an argument that this withholding contravenes EU law.

Putting these complications to one side it would seem that a UK life assurance company investing pension business funds in French equities would be better off in an OEIC and obtaining 0% withholding than it would investing directly and suffering withholding tax at 15%.  However, UK investors see Europe as a single market.  For other European countries such as Holland, Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany pension business assets that are invested directly obtain a better rate of withholding under the relevant double taxation agreement than is available to an OEIC.

So a withholding tax optimised European portfolio would have its French investments in an OEIC and would invest directly in the relevant double taxation agreement European countries listed above.