Thanks to international de-offshorization efforts, offshore companies cannot be used for laundering money and evading taxes any longer. Most jurisdictions that used to keep their resident companies’ transactions secret now exchange fiscal information conforming to the CRS requirements. The names of ultimate company beneficiaries have to be revealed to the Registrar when the company is registered in an offshore zone. The Registrar, in their turn, has to reveal the company owners’ names to the authorities on a court decision. Thus, the business that you do via your offshore-registered company has to be 100% legal and transparent. At the same time, setting up a company in an offshore jurisdiction can serve a number of important business purposes. In other words, it can make very good economic sense to register an offshore company.

How to find the best Offshore Company?

There are dozens of offshore and mid-shore jurisdictions where you can find various attractive conditions for setting up a business company. The choice of the offshore zone will depend on your business objectives and personal preferences. Below we discuss the main benefits an offshore company can bring and give you some tips and hints on choosing the offshore jurisdiction that would fit you best depending on the type of business activities that you are involved in and on the kind of goals that you pursue. Many international entrepreneurs set up offshore companies in order to diversify and protect their assets. An offshore LLC is the most popular form of company ownership because corporate legislation of many jurisdictions efficiently protects the property belonging to LLCs from unlawful seizures and even legal suits. It takes only a few thousand dollar or euros to set up an offshore company but if you have an LLC in Nevis, for example, you can register any property in the name of the company and no one will be able to take it away from you. The same jurisdiction is also attractive for setting up a trust company there. An offshore trust can be an even more effective instrument of asset protection.

Offshore Company benefits:

Impressive tax benefits are also available in many offshore jurisdictions. Many of them do not tax foreign companies’ profits at all on the condition that the profits are derived from business operations abroad. All Caribbean offshores, for instance, levy a 0% tax on foreign companies that are not engaged in any business operations on their territories. Please bear in mind, however, that some offshore company maintenance costs going to involved anyway. Instead of taxes, you have to pay an annual company registration fee. The fee is payable anywhere you go but its amount is quite modest in most places. A few years ago, offshore jurisdictions offered tax incentives even to foreign companies that did business on their territories but these are not available any more in most places. Offshore countries have had to surrender to the big and powerful international fiscal organizations and raise their local taxes. If a company is taxable in an offshore zone, the tax rates are going to be rather high. Another important advantage that an offshore-registered company boasts the lack of bureaucracy involved in company formation and maintenance. If your company does not have an overly complicated ownership structure, the number of documents that you have to submit when registering it in an offshore zone is quite modest. Offshore industry experts will gladly assist you in collecting the application document package if you decide to open an offshore company.

where it is registered?

Besides, such companies often don’t have to file any financial reports. If a company is not taxable in the jurisdiction where it is registered; why would the local fiscal authorities want to know about the company’s income? Moreover, no audit needs to be conducted in many offshore zones. The latter benefit can also found in some mid-shore jurisdictions such as Gibraltar or Malta, for example. Please bear in mind though, that financial records have to be kept anyway. The company documentation may have to submitted on an official request. One more reason why businesspeople register offshore companies is to get access to banking services that are unavailable in their home countries. Naturally, if you own a company, you have to open a corporate bank account. We must admit that setting up a bank account for your offshore company can be an intricate issue. The matter is that some offshore jurisdictions have reputational problems and large banks often refuse to take such companies aboard. On the other hand, some offshores have strong and stable banks on their territories so you can register a company and open a corporate bank account in the same jurisdiction.

payment service providers:

Besides, the number of payment service providers and e-banks has been growing over recent years. These organizations are similar to traditional banks in many ways but they are not so selective when it comes to choosing clients. If you register a company in a reputable offshore jurisdiction such as the Cayman Islands, for example; you will have full access to international banking services; almost any large bank will gladly open a corporate account for you. All offshore zones offer considerable benefits to foreign entrepreneurs but some of them are unique in the sense that they offer especially lucrative conditions for a specific type of business. For instance, if you’d like to establish an offshore bank; you will find that St Lucia suits this purpose better than any other offshore country. The BVI is famous for the efficient instruments of intellectual property protection that it provides. As we have said above, Nevis is a good place to register a trust. Gibraltar issues gambling licenses and many gambling companies registered in this mid-shore jurisdiction. The Marshall Islands are popular with ship owners who register their marine vessels there.

Conclusion:

Registering an offshore company can also give you access to new regional markets. If you want to trade with American states; you have a choice of jurisdictions in the Caribbean that offer offshore services. If you would like to do business in the Pacific, Singapore is a possible candidate for registering a company there. The choice of offshore zones is great indeed and we highly recommend that you should apply for professional assistance if you want to register an offshore company.