British Virgin Islands company law Warning: You are not logged in. Your IP address will be publicly visible if you make any edits. If you log in or create an account, your edits will be attributed to your username, along with other benefits.Anti-spam check. Do not fill this in! ==Registering a company== [[File:British Virgin Islands Companies Registry (2).jpg|thumb|400px|right|The British Virgin Islands Companies Registry (part of the Registry of Corporate Affairs).]] In the British Virgin Islands, only a licensed [[registered agent]] can [[Company formation|form a company]].<ref>BVI Business Companies Act, section 6(2)</ref> It is not possible for a member of the public to do so. The principal reason for this is to reinforce [[anti-money laundering]] obligations under the Anti-Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Code of Practice, 2008. Any person who wishes to form a registered company must do so through a licensed agent, and the agent is required (amongst other things) to obtain [[Know your customer|client due diligence]] (sometimes referred to as "know your client", or KYC) to comply with the regulations.<ref>Anti-Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Code of Practice, Part III. In particular, regulation 17(1) provides: "For the purposes of this Code, the reference to "customer due diligence" refers to the steps required of an entity or a professional in dealings with an applicant for business or a customer in relation to a business relationship or one-off transaction in order to forestall and prevent money laundering, terrorist financing and other financial crimes."</ref> Almost all companies formed in the British Virgin Islands are now registered under the BVI Business Companies Act (although a large number of existing companies were originally registered under the International Business Companies Act). In addition there are a small number of statutory corporations, most of which serve some kind of public function.<ref>For example, the British Virgin Islands Electricity Corporation is a statutory corporation formed under British Virgin Islands Electricity Corporation Act, 1978</ref> Under the BVI Business Companies Act it is possible to register five broad types of company:<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.harneys.com/files/BVIBCA%20Types%20of%20Companies.pdf|title=Types of Companies under the BVI Business Companies Act, 2004|publisher=[[Harney Westwood & Riegels]]|date=January 2009|access-date=25 February 2014|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150924025000/http://www.harneys.com/files/BVIBCA%20Types%20of%20Companies.pdf|archive-date=24 September 2015|url-status=dead}}</ref> # Company limited by shares # Company limited by guarantee and not authorised to issue shares # Company limited by guarantee and authorised to issue shares # Unlimited company authorised to issue shares # Unlimited company not authorised to issue shares In practice the vast majority of companies are registered as companies limited by shares. Furthermore, when registering a company, the company may also further be registered specifically as: # [[Segregated portfolio company]] # Restricted purpose company A segregated portfolio company is a company which segregates the assets and liabilities of different classes of shares from each other and from the general assets of the company. All segregated portfolio companies are required to include the designation "(SPC)" within their name, and must comply with the Segregated Portfolio Company Regulations, 2005.<ref>SI No 96 of 2005</ref> A restricted purpose company is a special type of company intended for use in [[bankruptcy remote]] [[Bond (finance)|bond issues]], and which only has limited [[Capacity (law)|corporate capacity]] to undertake certain specific purposes. Slightly unusually, in the British Virgin Islands the formation of a company does not involve the issuing of subscriber shares. Accordingly, when a company is incorporated it initially has no members. The registered agent has a statutory power to appoint the first directors of the company, and the first directors can then receive subscriptions and issue shares. However, until the first shares are issued the directors are personally liable for anything which they do in the name of the company. BVI enjoys 0% Taxation, no auditing and no paid up capital requirement. With over half its income coming from the licensing of offshore companies and related services, the BVI is a significant global player in the offshore financial services industry. Once frequently labelled as a "tax haven", the territory has fought hard against the label in recent years, signing the Multilateral Convention on Mutual Assistance in Tax Matters in June 2013. Re-positioning itself as a responsible international financial centre and tax planning destination, the BVI has turned its attention to Asia-based clients.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://www.sfm.com/bvi-offshore-company |title=Offshore Company Formation in BVI (British Virgin Islands) |publisher=[[SFM Corporate Services]]|access-date=11 November 2020}}</ref> Summary: Please note that all contributions to Christianpedia may be edited, altered, or removed by other contributors. If you do not want your writing to be edited mercilessly, then do not submit it here. You are also promising us that you wrote this yourself, or copied it from a public domain or similar free resource (see Christianpedia:Copyrights for details). Do not submit copyrighted work without permission! Cancel Editing help (opens in new window) Discuss this page