Isle of Man: Financial Services Chief Says Abuse Of Corporate Services Is More Difficult

Robert Lee, Tax-news.com, London

22 February 2001

The Isle of Man press recently reported Financial Supervision Commission chief executive, John Aspden, as saying that abuse of corporate services is "increasingly more difficult" now that the Isle of Man government has endeavoured to tighten up its financial regulations in this regard.

Mr Apsden's comments come following the trial of millionaire Michael Stannard, who was recently found guilty of defrauding the Inland Revenue in the UK. He was described in court as a "professional tax avoider" and had shady companies in the Isle of Man, Jersey and Ireland. The court heard how he bought UK companies with tax debts and gave them loans from a bank he had set up to give the impression the debts had been paid. The companies then invested in Stannard-controlled companies in the aforementioned offshore financial centres. But the transactions were not real.

Since the time of Mr Stannard's less-than-savoury business dealings, the Isle of Man has considerably improved its regulatory regime, said Mr Apsden. He was quoted in the press as saying: 'From the corporate point of view abuse is increasingly more difficult to arrange through the Island. Corporate service providers will be licensed and they are already required by anti-money laundering legislation to "know their customer"'.

He continued: 'This knowledge will need to extend to the purpose for which client companies are established and, to the extent that any of the CSP's officers are involved in the subsequent running of the companies, to monitoring and, if necessary, reporting any "suspicious transactions"'.

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