White list placing finds favour in China
Tuesday 5th May 2009, 2:30PM BST.
GUERNSEY’S ‘white list’ status has given it an edge on competitors trying to secure business in China, it has been claimed.
A delegation from Guernsey spent a week in the country at the end of last month meeting senior government and regulatory officials as well as fiduciary and funds business introducers such as lawyers and accountants in both Beijing and Shanghai.
‘A recurring theme of the meetings was Guernsey’s position on the OECD white list that was published at the conclusion of the G20 summit in London at the start of April,’ said GuernseyFinance chief executive Peter Niven.
‘Our hosts were particularly interested in how this compared with the grey listing of the Cayman Islands and the British Virgin Islands – two jurisdictions which are widely used in China for company formation.
‘In fact, several senior officials specifically brought up the issue and were keen to learn about the work we had undertaken to achieve the white-list status.’
Mr Niven (pictured) said this fact would be maximised in the future, as would the interest shown in the potential for listing on the Channel Island Stock Exchange as a way to access European markets.
The Guernsey delegation comprised Mr Niven and representatives from Trident Trust, Goethe Management, Richmond Fiduciary Group and Deloitte.
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Why are you constantly going to China. It is not the market and golden cow you believe it to be. Look at the figure of unemployed, the growth they are not going to get.
Better spend more time in the UK lobbying those sceptics that still confuse us with a Tax-Haven.
Spend you money wisely, remember the States are starting to ask questions…. How many trips can you get to London with what is spent on a single trip to China?? A few I suspect – just a thought
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There were no white, grey, black or any other coloured lists published by the OECD after the G20 summit in London in April. They merely published “progress reports”. Guernsey was reported to have made progress because it rushed to sign just over the minimum of 12 TIEAs required. But is is increasingly being blacklisted by international, UK and Channel Island-resident depositiors as a centre for depositing savings.
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MJA – the OECD published a list in 3 categories, and we were in the top one, commonly referred to as the “white list”. Also in that group were the UK, US, France, Germany, etc. By the OECD criteria, we are treated on a par with those countries.
We signed the first TIEA back in 2002. Since then we stopped signing them because everyone else was holding off too. We made it clear to the OECD that we were fully supportive of TIEAs but wanted some assurances that other jurisdictions would do the same, so that we were not disadvantaged. The signing of 12 TIEAs in quick succession did not demonstrate a change of heart on our part, just that the situation meant that other countries were doing it too, and that there were reasons for us to take a unilateral approach rather than keep pressing for the level playing field.
Blacklisting is not happening for the business that drives this economy. Maybe depositors are looking elsewhere, but frankly retail bank deposit business is irrelevant to the island economy.
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“retail bank deposit business is irrelevant to the island economy” That’s why Guernsey has been blacklisted by international depositors, who are moving to the Isle of Man where the Govt has shown that it does care about stricken savers.
Problem for Guernsey is that with the collapse of wholesale money markets, savers’ deposits are becoming increasingly important for finance centres.
No white, black or even grey lists; just progress reports. Ask the OECD Secretariat, if you don’t believe me.
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MJA – I am well aware that the OECD does not describe its lists as black, white or grey, hence my earlier post.
But if you look at the OECD progress report, it does not say that Guernsey has “made progress” as you suggest, it actually says that it has substantially implemented the internationally agreed tax standard. That does not mean that we’ve “made progress” it means that we have done everything that we have been asked to do. They have not asked for anything else and so at this point in time we are in the “job done” category rather than the “progress still to be made” category.
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