Cayman Islands Passes New Legislation

Recently a new legislation has been passed in the Cayman Islands where certain entities incorporated under its jurisdiction will be required to maintain the beneficial ownership information current and report certain beneficial ownership information to governmental authorities. Under this new regulation, only reportable persons and entities are registrable. Among other factors, a natural person is registrable if such individual controls, directly or indirectly more than 25% of the shares or voting power of the Cayman company. Additionally, any individual possessing the direct or indirect right to control or influence the company is also reportable and registrable. The information will be periodically uploaded into a search platform maintained by the Cayman Islands government authorities, called the Beneficial Ownership Platform, and it will be accessible under certain conditions.

The new legislation came into force on July 1 2017, and we advise that any person that owns a Cayman legal entity should contact their legal representatives to analyze whether these entities are being affected by the changes in the law. Information held on the platform will not be available to the general public and failure to comply with the new legislation will result in significant fines and possible criminal charges.