Barbara Niederkofler and Blayne Grady Discuss Offshore Fund Formation with Corporate Counsel Business Journal

Akin Gump investment management partners Barbara Niederkofler and Blayne Grady spoke with Corporate Counsel Business Journal for the article “The Evolution of Offshore Fund Formation,” in which they discuss recent trends in the offshore financial sector as well as how they work best with local counsel on behalf of clients.

Grady spoke of some trends he is seeing, including increasing regulatory enhancements and greater flexibility and options in fund structuring. For her part, Niederkofler said the persons with significant control regime, “which aims for transparency around the ownership of entities and was originally based in the United Kingdom, has now spread to other jurisdictions.”

The main offshore jurisdiction for U.S. managers continues to be the Cayman Islands, noted Niederkofler. For those outside of the United States, she said there has been growing interest “in some of the more nontraditional jurisdictions – like Jersey in the Channel Islands,” along with Canada, Malta and Scotland.

When deciding which offshore jurisdiction to use, Grady said it is important that the country “has a well-established, sophisticated legal system to make sure that rights and obligations are enforceable.” He said it is also critical to look at costs, ease of formation, ease of operation and entity administration.

To read the article in its entirety, please click here.