Is there any offshore company or trust protecting assets?

[lory]

With all the new laws and regulations introduced in the last 5 to 10 years, I wonder if there's still any possibility for a setup that can truly protect one's wealth from government intervention—or have we reached the point where everything you own is also owned by the tax authorities?

Is a Trust or a durable corporate setup now only reserved for the ultra-rich to protect their fortunes and businesses?

 

[JohnLocke]

I don't have a solution or setup suggestion, but I'm curious if anyone has ideas for what a possible setup could look like.
From all we know here from OCT, solving this is becoming an impossible task. Particularly with the banks, the state can just freeze accounts whenever they want.

 

[CyprusLawyer101]

Cyprus real estate under a trust can be a robust asset protective measure.

 

[JohnLocke]

In another thread, I read that you need to have a minimum of 5 million Euros for it to be worthwhile to look for such solutions because they are simply too expensive to operate. You can easily end up paying between 15,000 and 50,000 euros a year in fees.

 

[ZipZop]

I don't have a solution or setup suggestion, but I'm curious if anyone has ideas for what a possible setup could look like.
From all we know here from OCT, solving this is becoming an impossible task. Particularly with the banks, the state can just freeze accounts whenever they want.

First of all, like almost anything, that only works on a preventive basis and not when a case is ongoing (bankruptcy process, legal issues,etc..)

in my opinion, on the legal side, there is today nothing better than a cross-border protective asset Trust in the Cook Island jurisdiction mixed with à St-Kitt operational company.
the legal part is really important, especially the "impossibility to act" scenario.

here is a small summary:

1) set up a protective asset Trust in Cook Islands, which will owns 100% of a LLC in St-Kitt Nevis.
2) you are the sole director of the LLC and you put all your asset in it. so basically you keep full control of your assets.
3) in the scenario a legal case is opened against you, activate the "Impossibility to act" (there is another name for it, I forgot sorry) article so your trustee (the one of the Trust which owns 100% of your LLC) will automatically replace you as director. he has to be a lawyer. The trustee has to respect the law of Cook Island and St-Kitt which basically are as following:

- Statute of limitation of 1 to 2 years depending of the case
- Cook Islands Does not recognize any foreign court order so a new case has to be open locally (see above)
- Does not recognize foreign court order
- very friendly debtor-law (in case statute of limitation cannot be invoked)
- Can owns any kind of assets anywhere in the world
- Trust Deed is not recorded in the public records
- even if the settlor or beneficiary declares bankruptcy the asset are fully protected
- The only way to breach all of that is for the plaintiff to prove you did this structure only to avoid to pay him or hide your assets from him (this is why it is important to do it in a preventive way and not last minute), but.. as it is part of NZ, Trust has other benefits such as estate planning and international diversification, which one can give as reasons for establishing the trust in order to avert creditor claims.
- list is non exhaustive


anyway you have of course to be smart about it and not rush. it would be stupid for an american to do this type of structure and open the corporate bank accounts in the US for example. like any legal structure, you will spend less time and money to set it up right from day one than correcting your mistakes later on.

 

[JohnLocke]

Thank you for this fantastic and useful suggestion! May I ask what your background is to be able to set up such a configuration?

 

[ZipZop]

legal background in Switzerland, now in UAE basically doing private equity advisory as well as Family office structures for CIS/Asian clients mostly.

I am not a lawyer, especially not in Cook Islands or St-Kitt. but I stay updated about the different possibilities.

my summary about the structure is not complete but that would allow anybody to put it in his/her top 5 and then start doing his/her homework

 

[turmpy]

my summary about the structure is not complete but that would allow anybody to put it in his/her top 5 and then start doing his/her homework

your post is more than useful for me.

 

[GPT]

First of all, like almost anything, that only works on a preventive basis and not when a case is ongoing (bankruptcy process, legal issues,etc..)

in my opinion, on the legal side, there is today nothing better than a cross-border protective asset Trust in the Cook Island jurisdiction mixed with à St-Kitt operational company.
the legal part is really important, especially the "impossibility to act" scenario.

here is a small summary:

1) set up a protective asset Trust in Cook Islands, which will owns 100% of a LLC in St-Kitt Nevis.
2) you are the sole director of the LLC and you put all your asset in it. so basically you keep full control of your assets.
3) in the scenario a legal case is opened against you, activate the "Impossibility to act" (there is another name for it, I forgot sorry) article so your trustee (the one of the Trust which owns 100% of your LLC) will automatically replace you as director. he has to be a lawyer. The trustee has to respect the law of Cook Island and St-Kitt which basically are as following:

- Statute of limitation of 1 to 2 years depending of the case
- Cook Islands Does not recognize any foreign court order so a new case has to be open locally (see above)
- Does not recognize foreign court order
- very friendly debtor-law (in case statute of limitation cannot be invoked)
- Can owns any kind of assets anywhere in the world
- Trust Deed is not recorded in the public records
- even if the settlor or beneficiary declares bankruptcy the asset are fully protected
- The only way to breach all of that is for the plaintiff to prove you did this structure only to avoid to pay him or hide your assets from him (this is why it is important to do it in a preventive way and not last minute), but.. as it is part of NZ, Trust has other benefits such as estate planning and international diversification, which one can give as reasons for establishing the trust in order to avert creditor claims.
- list is non exhaustive


anyway you have of course to be smart about it and not rush. it would be stupid for an american to do this type of structure and open the corporate bank accounts in the US for example. like any legal structure, you will spend less time and money to set it up right from day one than correcting your mistakes later on.

St Kitts being a nightmare banking wise at the moment. Other than that you are on the money. If not mistaken st kitts is grey listed which makes it a nightmare to work with.

Only thing with tax authorities is that regardless of who owns it, if they can get their hands on it (real estate or art being prime examples) they will until everything is cleared regardless of legal ownership.