BARBADOS

The economy has diversified from sugar production into tourism and financial services. The government has become more business-friendly and lately has been economically sound. Barbados offers a wide range of offshore formats, and benefits from profitable trade partnerships with the US and Canada. The offshore insurance sector is booming, and there are a growing number of offshore banks. The stock exchange is fully computerized with a central depositary, although mutual funds have not yet developed strongly. There is a wide range of corporate formats, but the taxation structure is complex, although not unduly high. There are manufacturing and other domestic...

EXPERT INSIGHTS 2020

By Reuters Staff   BRUSSELS (Reuters) - European Union finance ministers added Anguilla and Barbados to the EU’s blacklist of tax havens on Tuesday and removed the Cayman Islands and Oman after they passed the necessary reforms.   The EU list, set up in 2017 after revelations of widespread tax evasion and avoidance schemes, now includes 12 jurisdictions: American Samoa, Anguilla, Barbados, Fiji, Guam, Palau, Panama, Samoa, Seychelles, Trinidad and Tobago, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Vanuatu.     Those on the blacklist face reputational damages, higher scrutiny in their financial transactions, and risk losing EU funds.   Source: Reuters

FUNDS & FUNDS SERVICES NEWS 2020

A Caribbean Offshore Financial Services Stalwart By James Zhang. Since its independence from the British colonial rule in 1966, the island nation of Barbados with a size of 431 square kilometers and a population of some 280,000, has successfully transformed itself from a low-income economy dependent upon sugarcane cultivation, into a diversified upper-middle-income one reliant on offshore financial services and the tourism sectors.  The offshore financial service sector, foreign direct-investment and tourism are the propellers of the economy. These are attributable at least in part to the Barbadian government's initiatives to evolve the nation into a service-driven economy and a...

ARTICLE OVERVIEW - EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2015

What are the key advantages of your jurisdiction in terms of privacy & asset protection for a Chinese HNWI or Family (etc.) looking to succeed their assets to the next generation? In an increasingly transparent world Barbados offers a range of mechanisms that enable Chinese HNWI & families to operate regulated and legally tax compliant structures from within Barbados.  Such structures will be robust and withstand review and will not therefore be deconstructed and ultimately fail due to lack of legal tax compliance when reviewed by Chinese or other tax authorities. In terms of cost, how is the cost of...

CORPORATE & FIDUCIARY JURISDICTION 2015

The economy has diversified from sugar production into tourism and financial services. The government has become more business-friendly and lately has been economically sound. Barbados offers a wide range of offshore formats, and benefits from profitable trade partnerships with the US and Canada. The offshore insurance sector is booming, and there are a growing number of offshore banks. The stock exchange is fully computerized with a central depositary, although mutual funds have not yet developed strongly. There is a wide range of corporate formats, but the taxation structure is complex, although not unduly high. There are manufacturing and other domestic...

CORPORATE & FIDUCIARY OVERVIEW - EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2014

By James Zhang. Since the offshore finance sector had become a backbone industry for Barbados' economy in the late 1990s, the magnitude and spectra of Barbadian banking and related services have been expanding immensely. The overwhelming majority of the clientele of Barbados' 47 offshore banks plus hundreds of trust, insurance and consulting service providers sitting on an island of 431 square kilometers, is overseas. Barbadian and Chinese governments came into an agreement in July 2000 to avoid double taxation, Chinese investments in the Caribbean nation has surged henceforth. Barbadian Prime Minister Freundel Stuart visited China with stopovers in Beijing and Shanghai...

PRIVATE & INTERNATIONAL BANKING OVERVIEW - EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2014

The recent China visit by Mr. Freundel J. Stuart, Prime Minister of Barbados is bound to foster a closer economic partnership between the two nations. Asia Outbound is honoured to have interviewed His Excellency The Honourable Mr. Freundel Jerome Stuart, the Prime Minister of Barbados. Below is a vivid manifest of how a relatively new offshore player wishes to perform for Chinese offshore clientele. Q: What is the current macroeconomic prospect for Barbados under the backdrop of a slow, frail global recovery from the worst crisis since the 1930s, whilst new debt crises in the US and Europe are alarming...

CORPORATE & FIDUCIARY JURISDICTION 2014

By Iain Manley. Offshore financial centers may have taken their cue from Switzerland's legal system, but it is the islands of Britain's former empire that have come to define them. Islands were a first foothold in foreign places for not just the British but all of Europe's empire builders. They were centers of trade and jumping off points, where diplomats, missionaries and merchants prepared for expeditions to the nearby continents. Hong Kong was a staging post for China, Singapore for Southeast Asia, the West Indies for North America, and in many ways, they all still are. Like many of the...

CORPORATE & FIDUCIARY OVERVIEW - EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 2014