Offshore Companies for Asset Protection Guide

Quick search links:

Companies as asset protection vehicles

Companies can be considered great asset protection vehicles, and the better they are structured, the more level of protection you can get.

For example, instead of forming the company in the jurisdiction where you live and can easily get sued, you can form a company in a highly private jurisdiction and with great asset protection laws where it would be extremely difficult for creditors to get t

Or you could acquire your assets under a foreign company, making it truly difficult for creditors to find out or prove your ownership of this company.

Limited Liability

Most types of companies have what is called “limited liability”, meaning that only the company is liable for the company’s debts, and not the owners.

For example, if a company is bankrupt, creditors cannot go after the Shareholders’ assets. Another example is if the company is a subsidiary, the creditors cannot go after the holding company assets.

Charging Orders

Let’s imagine an individual has a personal debt, and the Creditor tries to seize the Shares that the Debtor of a company. In some jurisdictions this is not possible, these jurisdictions would only allow the Creditor to impose a Charging order on dividends or distributions paid by the Company to the Debtor. In other words, the creditor can only seize the dividend or distribution payments made to the Debtor, but the Creditor cannot seize the debtor’s shares or ownership of the company.

The above is Charging Order protection, where a creditor can only seize the Debtor’s distribution or dividends paid to him/her, but cannot seize the company’s ownership or control.

Trust with Offshore Company Structure

One common structure is to have an offshore company under a Trust, this gives and optimizes your asset protection strategy.

Usually, the Trust appoints some close to the Settlor as the manager of the company.

In addition, this structure gives extra control over the trust assets and reduces the Trustee fees.

For example, we create an Offshore Trust, and this trust owns an Offshore Company. We would appoint the Settlor or someone close to the Settlor as the manager or CEO of the Company. The Offshore Company would own bank accounts, or operate a business, under the management of the Settlor.