Cox: Bermuda To Be Fully Compliant By End Of 2009

by Jason Gorringe, Tax-News.com, London

08 April 2009

Bermuda’s Finance Minister Paula Cox has released a statement regarding Bermuda’s placement on the OECD’s list of uncooperative territories. The OECD’s list features Bermuda in the second tier of compliant territories who have not substantially implemented the OECD standard.

In a statement after the OECD’s announcement, Paula Cox described the OECD's latest list as a ‘progress report’ announcing that Bermuda would be in the top tier of ‘fully compliant’ countries by the end of 2009.

Bermuda has currently concluded three Tax Information Exchange Agreements following its adoption of OECD principles of transparency and information exchange on May 15, 2000. Bermuda currently holds TIEAs with the United States, Australia and the United Kingdom.

Within the Bermuda government’s statement Cox said that although Bermuda had not yet achieved the benchmark 12 TIEAs required to be placed on the OECD’s list of fully-compliant jurisdictions, eight were in the pipeline with the seven Nordic countries and New Zealand, which are expected to be concluded on April 16, 2009. “A TIEA with Germany is planned for the near future, bringing Bermuda's total to 12 in fairly short order. At least two more TIEAs are expected to be signed by the end of this year or early next year,” reassured Cox.

"Based on our understanding that the OECD standard was very recently set at 12 treaties, Bermuda will have met the standard before the close of 2009 and most probably ahead of the next G20 Summit Meeting which is scheduled for later in the year,” Cox concluded.

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