The law firm, the world’s largest offshore firm by partner numbers, said the data suggested that markets are continuing to recover from the lows of early 2009, but that there was also “still some volatility in the marketplace”.
It said the year-end total would thus be an important indication of which direction volumes were going, adding that Appleby would be watching the offshore incorporation registries closely for this reason.
First-ever ‘On the Register’ report
The offshore company registration data emerged from the firm’s first-ever On the Register report, which, it said, it is launching in order to provide “insight and data on company incorporations in offshore financial centres”.
“Globally, offshore new company registrations are slowly returning to the levels that were seen before the global recession,” Appleby said in a statement today, outlining the report’s findings.
“However… the number of new offshore company incorporations in the first half of 2012 represented a decrease of 4% on the same period a year earlier.”
From 833,086 at the end of December, 2011, the number of active offshore companies fell to 801,168 by the end of June, Appleby said, although “the uptick in registrations from the previous six-month period shows there is still a healthy amount of activity going on across the offshore world”.
Based on the report’s findings, jurisdictions such as the British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands and Mauritius “likely will continue to remain attractive destinations for registering offshore businesses”, the Appleby statement added.
Farah Ballands, an Appleby partner and its global head of Fiduciary and Administration, said the offshore jurisdictions remain “pretty optimistic that they have a strong value proposition and remain attractive destinations for registering businesses”.
“A number of the offshore jurisdictions are showing a clear positive direction, with year-on-year increases in registration activity since 2009,” she added.
The report looks at incorporation trends in the British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Bermuda, the Crown Dependencies, Mauritius and the Seychelles, and also provides insights into how activity in these jurisdictions compares to that of such financial centres as the UK and Hong Kong.
Among the report’s other key findings are that, based on the data from the first half of 2012:
- The jurisdiction that is dominating offshore new company registration activity by volume is the British Virgin Islands, “which has consistently maintained a six-fold lead ahead of its nearest comparator, the Cayman Islands”
- The Cayman Islands is the fastest growth jurisdiction for new registrations, with a 13% increase in the first half of 2012 compared with the previous six months
- The Seychelles is the offshore economy “witnessing the greatest growth in activity", even though its data collection "lags behind the other jurisdictions” tracked by the Appleby researchers. Company registrations in the Seychelles grew by 20% between 2010 and 2011
- Bermuda remains “an attractive place to incorporate”, with the number of new company incorporations “maintaining a reassuringly steady flow over the last three years”
- The UK and Hong Kong, as “onshore comparators”, are showing signs of continued recovery, with both annual registrations and total active companies showing year-on-year improvement; by the end of 2012, the UK is expected to have some 200,000 more active companies than a year earlier
To read and download Appleby’s new On the Register report, click here.
