The Seychelles Foundations

As a long-standing provider of legal services concerning private interest foundations under Panamanian and the Seychelles legislations, we have noticed a recent surge of interest concerning certain aspects of the Seychelles foundations which represent additional benefits, flexibility and protection for the founder and the beneficiaries under the Seychelles Foundations Act of 2009 as amended in 2011.

The Seychelles Foundation may be organized for various purposes, as a Private Interest Foundation, as a Charitable Foundation for charitable purposes or a Purpose Foundation for a specific purpose. The Foundation is constituted by a Founder (or Founders), a Beneficiary (or Beneficiaries) and a Foundation Council. It may also have a Protector, if required.  The Founder(s), the Beneficiaries, the members of the Foundation Council and the Protector may be natural persons or legal entities. The Foundation Council is in charge of its management.

In order to constitute a Seychelles Foundation, a Foundation Charter is submitted in writing to the regulatory Seychelles International Business Authority. Said document does not have to include the names of the Founder or the Councillors.  The names of the individuals or legal entities of the Founder, Co-Founder, Councillor and Beneficiaries do not have to be disclosed to the Registry.

Any individual or legal entity may be the Founder, who may have one or more Co-Founders. The Founder may appoint of remove beneficiaries, decide if any investment is to be made, and even dissolve the Foundation.  The Founder may also assign those rights to another party.  The Founder may also be a Beneficiary, but not the only beneficiary. A Protector of the Foundation may be appointed in the Charter or in the Regulations of the Foundation, and the Protector may be a Founder or a Councillor or a Beneficiary, but one Councillor or one Beneficiary alone may not be Protector.

An additional attractive item of the Seychelles Foundations is that the Charter may be written English or in French, or in another language if an English translation is provided.

The accounting records of the Foundation may be kept in its registered office in the Seychelles.

All of the assets transferred to the Foundation become the property of the Foundation until those assets are actually transferred to the beneficiaries.  Until such transfer takes place, the legal owner of the assets of the Foundation is the Foundation.

An added attraction of a Seychelles Foundation is that is that its assets may be the shares of an offshore legal entity, but it would not have to declare and pay taxes for such legal entity’s dividends or profits.

OTHER ADVANTAGES

• No taxation
• Flexible structure for operating
• US$200 yearly fees payable to Seychelles authority
• Complete foreign ownership and control of assets
• Effective protection of any and all assets
• No taxation for earnings of the assets

COMMON USES

The Seychelles Foundation has many uses, some of which are:

• Estate planning
• Holding assets (bank accounts, brokerage, mutual funds, special license)
• Real estate ownership
• Own interests or shares in other companies, foundations or trusts.