Introduction
Offshore jurisdictions developed historically to reduce or contain challenges to wealth holdings and creations. The challenges or threats could be political, family, fiscal or even economic. For example, Switzerland and London have long been havens for flight capital from politically unstable parts of the world. While the Bermudan or Jersey trust has often been used to provide for family members who either do not wish or are unable to manage assets, similarly sophisticated vehicles have always been available to the high net worth individual, from the developed world, who wishes to legitimately minimise his taxation liabilities.
More modern uses for offshore centres include playing a role, and often a key role, in multinational financial transactions, which arise as a result of the continuing integration/globalisation of the world’s economy. For example, to set up an insurance company to carry special types of commercial risk is much more feasible in an offshore
