Cayman faces long wait to get off EU blacklist
(CNS): As expected, following warnings last week the Cayman Islands was added to the European Union’s list of non-cooperative jurisdictions regarding tax issues on Tuesday. It seems the jurisdiction will now have to wait until October before it gets off this list, which it has apparently landed on due to the tardiness in passing a crucial piece of legislation and missing a key deadline by a matter of days. The premier said it was “deeply disappointing” but he had begun talks to remove this country from the list.
Cayman was one of four new jurisdictions added to the EU blacklist, along with Panama, the Seychelles and Palau. They join eight jurisdictions that have been on the list for several years: Fiji, Oman, Samoa, Trinidad and Tobago, Vanuatu, Samoa, Guam and the US Virgin Islands.
Premier Alden McLaughlin once again claimed that Cayman had cooperated with the EU to deliver on our commitments to enhance tax good governance. He said that since 2018, Cayman has adopted more than 15 legislative changes in line with the EU’s criteria, and in April 2019 the EU confirmed that Cayman had satisfied its economic substance requirements, with the exception of economic substance for funds, also known as collective investment vehicles (CIVs).
On 31 January 2020, Cayman passed the Private Funds Law and the Mutual Funds (Amendment) Law, both of which address the CIV issues. The laws came into force on 7 February, which was a week after the EU deadline but crucially after a key meeting, held just days before, where the blacklisting decisions were to be made.
The premier appeared to claim that as it had notified the EU that the necessary law was passed, but the fact that it was not in force by 4 February, when the EU’s Code of Conduct Group (CoCG) met to advise the EU Finance Ministers about today’s blacklist, was not considered.
McLaughlin claimed that much of the flurry of legislation introducing numerous changes to the offshore sector was based on what the EU said they wanted.
“While Cayman consulted with a number of stakeholders on our legislation, including our financial services industry, the principal components of our new and revised laws were shaped by the EU’s criteria,” McLaughlin said. He added that Cayman remains committed to a six-month transition period for registering required funds in accordance with the new Private Funds and amended Mutual Funds laws.
Since the EU began its listing process in December 2017, almost 30 countries have been listed as non-cooperative but most are removed once they have done what is required.
Premier McLaughlin said the Cayman Islands Government acknowledged the EU’s statement today formally placing Cayman on a list of countries it would clearly prefer to distance itself from, but he added that dialogue will continue with listed jurisdictions. He said the Cayman Islands also remains fully committed to cooperating with the EU, and will continue to constructively engage with them with the view to be de-listed as soon as possible.
For its part, the EU clearly stated that the Cayman Islands was listed because investment funds based here do not reflect real economic activity on the archipelago. “That could lead to investment vehicles being created solely to reduce taxes in other jurisdictions,” officials stated.
But there were indications in the international media that EU lawmakers also had an eye on Brexit. German politician Markus Ferber, of the Christian Democrat EPP group, said this should serve as a warning to Britain as it tries to position itself in the global economy as a country outside the EU.
“The UK would be well advised to take note that EU Finance Ministers put a British Overseas Territory on the blacklist of tax havens. This sends a clear signal that the idea of turning the UK into a tax haven will not be acceptable to the EU,” he said.
But Cayman is the only UKOT to have been black-listed and EU Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said that the public shame was just as important. “There are reputational consequences because being blacklisted by the EU clearly is a signal about the problems in tax governance,” he said.
- Fascinated
- Happy
- Sad
- Angry
- Bored
- Afraid
Category: Business, Financial Services, Laws, Politics
Didn’t mention secrecy, Mr Quibble. You are and will be a tax haven or you will dry up and blow away. You create convenient tax structures useful in deals made by smarter and richer folks in New York and London. Call that “tax neutrality” if you want, no one cares, but trying to appease the EU does make you less and less convenient and useful to the people who count.
Our MLA’s are too busy spending our money to try and force through the lucrative port contract…Aldart is the most destructive self interested leader you have ever had.
Maybe the second worst. He hasn’t even been arrested or sued.
I know what you mean but at least that guy was so blatant there was only so much he could get away with….Aldart is pushing through everything for his benefactors and self with total disregrard to his countrymen. Disgusting
We made a mistake long ago. We never should have got ourselves into the “hiding money for rich people” business. We should see the writing on the wall and abandon this sleazy, immoral (legality aside) trade. There must be something we can do other than catering to the world’s tax cheats/evaders. Imagine how many murderous dictators we have helped hide money they looted from their people. Think about how wrong it is for companies making billions in annual profit to pay no taxes which shifts more burden on to everyday hard-working people in their countries. We are on the wrong side of this issue. Let’s make a plan and move on. We can do better.
Do better by leaving it all in Europe like all African dictators do villa in France and accounts in Switzerland like Germany looted gold smelted down from concentration camp victims our looted from poor countries in Africa protected by paid mercenaries and militia committing human rights atrocities by Europe’s finest a list companies and their high flying drug snorting &sex scandal executives Embezzlment, fraud tax evasion and corruption are as old as politics and prostitution. Our only mistake my friend is some fools who came here are so friggin arrogant they started boasting and advertising this shit to the rest of the world, when they should have kept it on the LoLo were it belongs.
To 8.30 it is not Cayman that is collecting those taxes , it is their home country.
Bermuda removed from EU tax grey list
http://www.royalgazette.com/news/article/20200218/bermuda-removed-from-eu-tax-grey-list&utm_source=newsletter20200219&utm_medium=email&utm_content=article_title&utm_campaign=newsletter
Why is the Bermuda Government so far ahead of us on financial services matters?
Are we really that stupid here? I just cannot understand our excuses.
Running to sign every piece of toilet paper europe has used to threatened us with is just what your weak minded colonial stooge forgetful generation and government can do Alden but it’s the highest disrespect to all our forefathers and merchantmen who fought and gave their precious lives to preserved and save their European ungrateful asses from Nazi Germany and its dictator maybe you should remind them in Brussels of that every time you waste our money to travel up and down to appease them,but that would take courage which both you and them it would appear lack. In fact mother should be reminded that even our historical items were melted down for the her war effort. In fact next time why don’t you send them a list of our war dead instead of capitulating to their threats like they did to Adolf Hitler.
Raffaelle…Now tellus what you would do.
I would go to Libya buy up one pile of sturdy and seaworthy vessels properly equip them with everything for a 10 day journey across the Mediterranean call every migrant,vagrant and plain all scallywags in that area and give them the boats free of charge and to promise me not overload the vessels cause I want their sea journey to be like a cruise across. When they get to Europe to send 100 euros to the Happy Landed in Europe Fund so I can buy some more vessels to keep it going How that ole Buddie ????
You need some help ole Buddie Raphael.
The pressure on Cayman and other offshore centre’s will not lessen until the only domicile to minimize taxes is Delaware and the best place to launder money remains NY and Florida.
Tara, it’s over for you sweetie.
This would not have happened under Wayne Panton’s watch.
Wayne Panton for Premier.
5.43. Sweetie? You are so condescending and disrespectful.
Lets just say sod it, go for real dirty money get blacklisted by everyone. We can make a fortune being a proper offshore taxhaven. lets not let millions in advertising in many films storing cash is Cayman.
Lets just go for it.
Idiot.
Antibot
The EU blacklist is a sham! Cayman hardly does EU business. Now that the UK is out of the EU we are done for. We will pass the legislation they want today and then they will move the goal posts the next day and it will never end until they have made doing business in Cayman so undesirable that it leaves.
Better off turn our backs on them now.
Doesn’t matter whether we do business directly with Europe or not it tarnishes our reputation
and our reputation is what brings business to us
How many of the other offshore financial centres would love to start pointing and saying don’t do business in Cayman they are blacklisted that might cause you trouble
Its not a direct impact issue, it just makes the whole situation more messy than it needs to be
Don’t know about your company 4:36 but my financial services company does a lot with Ireland, Luxembourg, Netherlands and Malta. They are all in the EU.
Getting off the blacklist is important for us.
So they enacted all the laws the EU requested but they did it 4 days late? Just giving the EU the excuse they wanted. Wow. What a bunch of clowns. Incredible
The Economic Substance legislation has been sitting there for a year not being enforced – whilst those responsible waste all their time (and public money) traveling all over the world to events they don’t really need to go to.
We need to look at those persons and the ministry with oversight ..Financial Services
3.24 You obviously have a one track mind if you believe that Govt needs to concentrate on Financial Services only. There are a whole lot of other things that Govt has to do including Promote tourism , look after health, education,environment, infrastructure, growing the economy etc . Some of dont even realize what they were doing in Monaco…they were trying to grow our shipping registry to add another leg to our economy. Some of just stay at home and act as keyboard warriors because you cant even negotiate the traffic outside let alone negotiate all the various duties that Govt has to perform.
You list a lot of public expenditure “back holes” there – health, education, the environment, infrastructure. All dependent on the Financial Services Industry – directly (CIMA & ROC fees) and indirectly (work permits, home/office construction, import duties) to produce the dollars to fill those holes.
4:34, How many trips have the Ministers and their officials taken to Monaco in the past 18 months?
THREE
How many trips have the Ministers and their officials taken to Brussels in the last 18 months?
ZERO
A total joke but a lovely time was had by all in Monaco.
Financials Services is our bread and butter here. Without financial services we are just another Caribbean island.
No ES reporting due yet so no enforcement possible.
What?! But wait! I thought Alden said this was just a guideline. A suggestion that he and his government had the power to lobby against! Is it possible that he might have made statements that were perhaps misleading?!
You are confusing confuse the UK’s FAC report with the EU’s listing process.
Regardless of whether this blacklisting has any quantitative effect on us in the near future, the psychological and ramifications of this blacklisting will likely last for decades
The oft found Pavlovian response automatically associating Cayman with dodgy tax practices and skirting the law at every opportunity has now been reinforced whether you think that reputation was initially justified or not
We have long since moved on from the suitcases full of money being brought in and the opening of bank accounts shrouded from the view of international governments but that does not mean the work is done
As the government and financial services sector claim we are trying to re-frame Cayman’s image away from a dodgy tax dodging island getaway to a respectable member of the international financial we go and pull shit like this
Ignoring the time frame given while still claiming we are being accommodating and reasonable
I’ll put it this way, if you go to university or have gone to university you know just how much a paper turned in a month late is worth…
Absolutely nothing, why are we then surprised the EU doesn’t value our late submissions and ‘compliance’ when we agreed to meet them in prior exchanges
What value are our assurances of compliance and a willingness to compromise when we can’t even meet something as basic as a deadline set far in advance
This rests squarely on the MLAs who sat back preferring to spend multiple sessions in the LA bashing gay people and waxing lyrical about supposed virtues and traditions
Nonsense. Everyone knows the EU commissioners are a bunch of unelected, meddling, useless old socialist dinosaurs. It’s why their over-taxed and over-regulated economies are failing so hard they have to come after ours.
At least in those jurisdictions the citizens pay their taxes to fund their expenditure and/or debt. HERE…CIG and the general populace loaf off the “taxes” (CIMA and ROC fees and duties etc.) paid by international entities and their employees and managers etc. that just happen to use Cayman as a jurisdiction…..
If the Cayman Populace ever had to actually pay income tax, corporate tax, rubbish collection fees etc. then PERHAPS…our members of the L.A. would actually be held to account for their inept behavior.
@6:34 and are you saying that you are willing or that Caymanians should be willing to pay annual property tax, income tax, capital gains tax wealth tax, sales tax? Oh wait, and death tax?
Yes, let’s give our Government more money to waste and turn Cayman into another socialist jurisdiction like many of the countries in Europe.
If you are Caymanian, then shame on you. If not, then feel free to leave!
No, I am not saying that at all. It obviously went waaaaay over your head.
What I am saying is that these members of the L.A. get away scot free, repeatedly, election are election and are never held to account by the public (or the legal system) for their ineptitude (and worse).
What I am trying to tease out, is that because there is no real public “buy-in” to oversight and accountability demanded from politicians because the vast majority of CIGs revenue is due, directly and indirectly, to overseas entities. If it was “all” our money (solely) that they were blowing/squandering/wasting, then perhaps, maybe ..just maybe…we would not keep voting the same morons in, time after time.
I’m Caymanian, btw.
@9:43 I get your point but accountability by politicians does not seem any more evident in countries that have direct taxes either.
Somebody should hold Tara accountable. She is the Minister responsible for this fine mess.
7:33, Accountability is a total joke here. Just look at the Airport Authority. No one knows what is going on there financially, because so many are feeding at the trough.
The EU is a neoliberal institution, the supports and promotes neoliberalism as it has done since its inception
The EU is now completely dominated entirely by France and Germany both led by neoliberal centrist governments (Even prior to the UK leaving, the EU was never even close to socialism)
The idea that the EU is socialistic or far left is laughable and only pushed by people who spent far too long watching fox news or reading the Sun
Anyone trying to convince you the EU is socialistic has no idea what they are talking about plain and simple
You are referring to the second largest single economic union in the world as “failing”
Just going to stop there, because the point makes itself
If the EU is failing, what are the rest of us doing?
Because we know nothing about letting politicians select members of secondary bodies that take votes and make decisions on our behalf right? Seriously?
The commissioners are appointed by the ELECTED heads of government of the various EU member states
Appointments made via elected official are legitimate last time I checked
We have dozens of them here in Cayman
And even the slightest bit of nuance blows your talking points out of the water, one only needs to look at the facts
The EU has 3 main government bodies:
-The EU Comissioners make up the Commission and are appointed and thus unelected bureaucrats you’re absolutely right .. the part you leave out is that they are appointed by elected officials (the members of the European Council who happen to be duly elected heads of governments of the EU member states) the President of the Comission is voted on by the European Parliament MEPs ( You know the same MEPs that are directly elected every 5 years)
That is 2 sets of elected members of various positions in public office who have to approve of the Commission
We all acknowledge not every public official needs to be elected, we don’t elect judges or civil servants here, the attempts to de-legitimize the EU are just part of talking points of nationalists and intellectually dishonest right wing nuts
– The Members of the European Parliament are directly elected as already stated and have to approve of the commission .. they are elected it’s that simple
– The European Council is made up of heads of state of the 26 EU Member states who all face various national level elections in their own respective countries.. they are elected it’s that simple
The EU maybe more convoluted than most nations, but the idea that they are undemocratic any more than the rest of us is laughable
We all have positions and offices that are subject to appointment or application then approval
I know it’s easy for you to be dishonest, but at least have a modicum of integrity
Poor old 2.36pm You seem to think that it was just one piece of legislation that we had to deal with. Sorry there were many pieces and there will be many more in the future. These people dont want Cayman to comply they want Cayman to submit and let them have their way just like Europeans have done to Caribbean countries in the past. They bully small territories like us but when a bigger bully comes along and bullies them they whimper and back down. Look at when Russia invaded the Ukraine one of the EUs allies, what did they do? Absolutely nothing. So it is all about bullying smaller states and when they get bullied do nothing.End
“they don’t want Cayman to comply”
Absolute rubbish, other jurisdictions made the same commitments we made they had the same deadline and they actually took their commitment seriously
and the EU responded in kind
Cayman is quick to make enemies and then cry wolf when they actually start using their political power to affect change
The EU has been using kid gloves at any time they could decide to change tactics, keep that in mind
This is the essentially the worst possible result. We have adopted all of these ridiculous laws to appease the EU, made it more difficult. expensive and cumbersome for people to do business here, annoyed our existing client base, and we have now been blacklisted anyway in spite of all this while our competitor jurisdictions have not.
As much as I think this government has been relatively reasonable and business-friendly, missing this deadline is absolutely inexcusable. As much as we like to blame the EU for bullying us this is essentially a self-inflicted wound. So disappointing.
I bet we’ll be on the blacklist again soon after October. That’s plenty of time for more deadlines to be missed and more skullduggery. Get on your knees and get used to it Alden, you ain’t changing your spots any time soon.
This was totally avoidable IF there were some competent people in government
& if we didn’t have a few 8-figure salary (yes, 8!) puppet masters in the legal fraternity throwing up endless roadblocks (which government are obliged to entertain if they want to be re-elected)
Cayxit
The EU is a bunch of bullies. Unfortunately for us if we want to protest against their bullying the highest court that we can appeal to is in their jurisdiction ie the European Courts of Human Rights. So if we want to appeal then we would basically be appealing to our bullies.
.
What is there to appeal? They have decided as a union to blacklist other jurisdictions that they feel do not satisfy their requests for transparency, that is their prerogative
Fun thing people here seem to leave out when mentioning the EU and the up until now potential for blacklisting… our government agreed to address their concerns and were given a set amount of time to do so, our government then failed to meet the deadline and thus we find ourselves on the list
We made a commitment on the international stage and failed to meet the terms of that commitment, there are consequences its a pretty simple cause and effect
Whether or not you think the EU is correct or being fair, they have every right to use their economic power as a union to influence change around the world in the same way the US and United Nations issue sanctions and lists on nations that they have political disagreements with like Iran and North Korea
Hating the EU in Cayman just seems like the trendy thing to do because we can illogically brand them all as far left bureaucrats despite them implementing decades of EU promoted centre right neoliberalism
The EU itself is a neoliberal economic institution with a clear focus on centre right policies not anywhere near the left wing of politics
If you think Macron and Angela Merkel are on the left in even the slightest of terms i have a statue I own in New York Harbour to sell you
To:The EU is just about as ‘left’ as my right foot I am the poster @1.30pm I don’t care if they are left, right, upside down, or right side up they are still bullies. I was talking about bullying and what would be the likely outcome if we appealed for relief and protection from the bullying.Incidentally your submissions tend to support my narrative when you say..”they have every right to use their economic power as a union to influence change around the world” Unfortunately that change is intended for their own benefit and not that of the territory being influenced.
The EU will never be satisfied- don’t know why Cayman is bending over backwards trying. Give them a few years and they will disintegrate. Without England and the US cutting back on how much they contribute they will be worse off than us. Some of these laws are so nonsensical it is pitiful.
Shows how much effort they put into bashing gays and pushing the port down people’s throat in the past year. Skewed priorities!
If you believe in a blacklist, you are totally deluded.
There is no such thing.
It is all a scam designed to fool ignorant people into believing that there is any kind of honour in the global financial system.
There is no honour in the quest for temporal wealth.
The noose tightens, people of Cayman. Soon you will not be able to breathe.
And while I am here and off topic, I would urge Tyson Fury not to get into the ring with Deontay Wilder this weekend. He will be killed and I mean literally. May I be wrong.
Have you been drinking?
Fury will box him up
Alden, Tara, Eden thanks for making Cayman a laughing stock. The whole world now knows how inadequate our gov is. Too busy worrying about what two gay consenting adults do.
Joey says he didn’t know anything about it until he read the news
I can believe that. If this Government spent more time focusing on the financial industry than on the port we would be in a better place. Alden, Tara and for that matter Joey should resign over this fiasco. They were told they had to pass the law before the end of 2019 and waited until January.
BVI did it, Bermuda did it, even the Bahamas did it – our Government thought they knew better!
Yes…spend the money their on knowledgeable spin doctors instead of thinking they can do it themselves and get a free trip out of it.
12.29pm Outright lie. But whats one little lie if it helps to discredit this Govt that you never wanted. Right? Shameful.
12:24 – 12:29 made a joke – a reference to Joey claiming at the Smith Cove protest that he didn’t know anything about the Smith Bacadere plans until the public did when Cayman Compass published it…
I was there – he said those words. Fills us with confidence…(that’s sarcasm).
Do Cabinet Members ever discuss major issues impacting Cayman around the Cabinet table?
Good. The island is full of crooks. All them trips Alden an them is making abroard us full of crap. Thet are doing nothing for the island except fill there pockets.
I do sincerely hope that the obligations in private funds law are put on hold until we are delisted.
If our intent is to get off the list (as it should be) then we should be escalating the implementation timeframe if anything. Dragging our feet to implement the changes (thank the lawyers for this) is what got us here to begin with. Entirely avoidable position to be in
Why get off it? Let’s embrace it.
Too late
The deadline slipped past while our MLAs were busy delivering homophobic rants in the chamber. I wonder if that had anything to do with the EU’s decision?
They were told they had to pass the law before the end of 2019 and waited until January.
BVI did it, Bermuda did it, even the Bahamas did it – our Government thought they knew better!
Too busy cavorting in Monaco.
Boi u love talking ‘bout Monaco.
There are many more places in this big wide world u know😜
3.10pm thats because he is a antibot posting again and again against the Govt.
Yes, a place called Brussels, capital of the EU.
Tara, you had one job to do ……..
Can our Honourable backwoods men and backwoods women in the L.A. even spell “Financial Services”? Probably not. But “Genesis”, “Exodus”, Leviticus, “Numbers”, “Deuteronomy”, “Joshua”, “Judges” and “Ruth” …”they know them all….”.
Only problem is, those books don’t pay the bills around here to fund our sub-standard, continuously non-performing Government School system, that keeps failing in the basic “3 Rs” (individual teachers, aside). It is the Financial Services Industry that pays for everything – through work permits, construction and (financial services) “tourism”. The same CIG school system that produces these Hounourable men and women for the L.A. to bloviate on “homosexuality” in the first place as opposed to saving the Golden Goose………..perhaps there is a perfect, catastrophic symmetry to all of this, after all……..
I should imagine that the cost of rectifying this missed deadline will be substantial in monetary terms. With there being no accountability for such mistakes, the same MLA’s will more than likely retain there seats at the next election. It boggles the mind.
Tax the lawyers if you want to recover the cost of this. Government is to blame too though…trying to placate every Tom, Dick and Harry rather than just making a decision. Public consultation should only go so far
It is the “public” i.e. the Financial Services Industry inteligentia that keeps this whole party going/ship afloat……they need/must be consulted, as the subject matter experts. What, you think any of the L.A. members actually understand what they are “passing” (other than hot air/gas)? After that, if the blinking’ L.A. sat for any decent amount of time and/or used the little time they do sit to pass the legislation on time, we wouldn’t be in this mess.
Ok it was moronic to screw this up, but let’s see how things are going in six months or a year. To actually follow the EU’s dictates may be more damaging than just accepting the black listing and refusing all cooperation. London and New York are where the business is, what do they want from Cayman? It may be the opposite of the EU’s wants. Being a tax haven is all you have going, and the EU wants to kill that. Just write them off and look elsewhere.
Again with the false tax secrecy narrative circa 1982. It doesn’t exist anymore. Cayman is not a “haven”, for anyone seeking to evade tax. Tax neutrality is not a sinister construct. It’s only comparatively “harmful” to uncompetitive regimes that have grown accustomed in the post WW2 era of overtaxing and under delivering. We didn’t author that tax code.
11.53am Common sense post. Unfortunately the CNS comment section is dominated by people with not so much of it. They prefer to criticize rather than put forward something sensible.
The problem is that we have already passed all the laws which will have a chilling effect on business here. It may be that the EU blacklisting isn’t devastating for business but it will certainly have a negative effect. It’s too late to “just see how things are going”. We either implement the legislation as planned and get off in six months, or repeal it all and don’t cooperate. Perhaps if our Caribbean competitors took the same approach we could “see how it works out” but if we decide we are the only serious offshore financial centre that doesn’t follow international standards I think we will find most of our business moving to BVI, Bermuda and Bahamas in short order.
Most of our EU business. All €100 of it. Meanwhile Russia, China, the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, Saudi, Israel, Africa and South America will flock to us because we don’t subject them to stupid unnecessary bureaucratic expensive draconian and time consuming guilty-til-proven-innocent nonsense every time they try to send us business.
2.34pm You seem to have missed the part that said the laws were implemented on 6th February, at least 10 days before the EU Commissioners decision. Which means that if they were acting in good faith they could have kept Cayman off the list. But they had another agenda. Refer to the two last paragraphs of the CNS article.
I haven’t missed anything. I was responding to the suggestion that we just stop cooperating and see where that gets us. The laws were passed and became effective on 7th February. But nothing has actually happened in terms of compliance. There is not yet a mechanism for private funds to register with CIMA. In theory we could repeal the economic substance law and private funds law and just stay on the blacklist.
Also, there was no requirement for the EU to “act in good faith” and consider the last-second passing of the laws. They gave a deadline, we missed it. Obviously they want us to be on the black list and will look for any excuse to do that. We just gave them an easy way to do it without considering the substance of the legislation. Had they been forcede to do that “in good faith”, we likely would have stayed off on the basis that the laws we have enacted are similar to the other offshore financial centers.
The EU is not in charge of international best practices. They have their views, but the countries you depend on do not operate by EU rules.
Agreed. Could be a good test to see if being on the blacklist actually matters. If not let’s tell the EU not to worry about taking us off the list and we’ll consider any future dictates from them on their merits.
Can this Government get anything right??
Boy the antibots ate out in full force on this one. Antibots=anti Govt bots.
Because Alden and his team of blowhards preferred to spend valuable time on the LA floor debating religious freedom and same sex marriage. I hope all voters wise up come 2021 and don’t vote for him or his lackeys.
Perhaps rather than everybody visiting Monaco last year everybody should have visited Brussels instead. Might have shown serious intent on the issue.
Where’s the fun (and gambling and shopping) in that?
Of course cig missed the deadline. Not surprised. At. All.
Antibot 11.26
Antibot hard at work
Guess that makes you an Anti-Antibot-bot
And local financial institutions did not believe what the government had worked was good enough. Not even close
I’d like to know how long the government was aware of the changes they needed to make to not be on the list. Did they have a long time or is was this the EU telling them what they needed and expecting them to get it done in a few days?
A year.
Bermuda, BVI & Bahamas seemed to get the EU message on time.
Stop trying to find excuses.
How long did you know this was coming. Last minute changes caused that.
Congratulations Alden McLaughlin and Tara Rivers another bag up job!
I guess the EU were not impressed with your arrogance and shallow chats along with Eric Bush and other offshore finance experts employed by CI government in key negotiations.
A trip to Brussels rather than a couple to Monaco last year might have been very helpful.
So rather than this being EU discrimination against Cayman, its actually our incompetent government failing (by three days!) to get legislation that they had already agreed to implement in place by an EU deadline which they were well aware of. Explains why Bermuda and BVI are not on the list – because their politicians and civil servants know how a calendar works! Its not as is our MLAs are so desperately overworked that they couldn’t have convened the necessary LA meetings a week earlier and get all the pieces in place in time. So now we have the all the costs and difficulties of the legislation, but are still on the blacklist for at least another 8 months.
We missed the Dec 31 deadline by a month and a half….laws were tabled as Bills beginning of Feb, and passed last week, and need to Gazette, with no Regs. It’s not like they didn’t know they had to do all of this “business of the country”, and they blew it anyway! Totally inept!
Too busy going to Monaco and focusing on the port and gay marriage.
Jarnot.. maybe BVI and/or Bermuda would be on the list if they were more popular. The idea is to bring down the champ and the others will be intimidated. While you’re looking over the article please take a serious look at the last two paragraphs, they clearly spell out the reasoning behind the decision.
“…much of the flurry of legislation introducing numerous changes to the offshore sector was based on what the EU said they wanted…”, with a well publicized deadline of Dec 31, 2019. There was also the reminder to comply, and final notice of consequences, delivered in November 2019, right before Tara trotted-off to Hollywood on our dime. You can’t make this stuff up.
This should be considered an honor, and a badge of accomplishment.
Now our leaders should meet with all of the offshore jurisdictions, form a coalition to have all of the other jurisdiction reject these EU sanctions and demands, and join the Cayman Islands on this blacklist and turn this blacklist into a global certification of good standing.
Should happen but never will!
Says Miss Cleo
You really don’t know anything about the Financial Services Industry, do you?
Alternate headlines: “The Importance of Having Adults that will Adhere to known International Deadlines”, or another, “This is why the LA should not be wasting finite session time protesting Legitimate Citizenship Rights”. How many different times did Brussels say we had until the end of 2019?!? This was literally Tara’s only job.
I don’t get it. 🤔 Why do we need some group 1000 miles away to tell us our banking is good???
Haven’t our banks started on their own and we became a great financial center? So, why do we need validation from some foreign bullying body ???
Because our spineless leaders have gone all-in on desperate appeasement and hoop-jumping to please the EU. Why I don’t know. Ingrained cowardice? Perhaps they think Monaco is a member? Your guess is a good as mine.
So 12.13 you don’t know why they were in Monaco do you. Please ask around. I heard it was to promote our Maritime business (shipping registry). Look it up in past items on CNS and the Compass.
The Maritime business is a drop in the bucket compared to what the financial services sector here does with the EU. Take a look at how many law firms and trust firms here have offices in E U countries. That says it all.
EU blacklist is more about tax practices rather then AML stuff (this is the OECD list)…not to say that our banks don’t care about this also but they really care about their correspondent bank relationships and therefore the OECD list
So the blacklisting was a direct result of government delay and incompetence. Alden taking responsibility? Never. Shame so much LA time was wasted “debating” the evils of homosexuality.
10.51am No the reason for blacklisting was “The UK would be well advised to take note that EU Finance Ministers put a British Overseas Territory on the blacklist of tax havens. This sends a clear signal that the idea of turning the UK into a tax haven will not be acceptable to the EU,” he said.
Also because they want to damage our reputation ” EU Commissioner Valdis Dombrovskis said that the public shame was just as important. “There are reputational consequences because being blacklisted by the EU clearly is a signal about the problems in tax governance,” he said.”
Yeah – that explanation sounds plausible right up until it turns out that a) no other BOTs got blacklisted -surely if there was a message there it would be all of them, and the Channel Islands being so much closer to home would be top of that list b) by strange coincidence we are the only BOT that seems to have missed the widely publicised deadline (despite reminders) and even the additional grace time granted between the deadline and the meeting of ministers on February 4.
Valdis is quite right – we have a massive problem with our governance – our government cant manage their way out of a paper bag.
5.48pm Valdis is right being blacklisted by the EU is sign that they have a problem with low tax destinations and try to cripple them by intimidation instead of lifting the tax burden on their own citizens.
How moronic do you have to be to miss a deadline this important by a few days? Pathetic.
More like a month – Alden and Tara should resign over this fiasco. They were told they had to pass the law before the end of 2019 and waited until January.