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NEWS
Jersey to open Hong
Kong, Indian offices 5
JPMorgan Trust in court
over ‘gross negligence’ 5
Artemis closes £1.8m
UK equity Sicav 5
SEI unveils multi-manager
Shariah fund 7
Guernsey redraws QROPS
rules to stop abuse 7
FirstRand launches
CI wealth business 7
Bespoke offshore bond
service from BarCap 8
New Star CIO victim
of manager shake-up 8
HMRC reveals details
of second tax probe 8
OECD countries hail raft
of new tax treaties 11
L&G rolls out tax planning
toolkit for advisers 11
FPI reports sharp
downturn in Q3 sales 12
Generali Int’l adds
commodities fund 12
Pimco introduces Liborplus
multi-asset fund 14
Sarasin in Dubai asset
management venture 14
Israel’s largest bank
opens in Jersey 15
Scarborough and Skipton
Guernsey to merge 15
Life firms ‘encouraging’
bad advice 48
Features – page 4
News analysis 18-19
The banking crisis
We assess the
long-term impact of
the collapse of KfS
and landsbanki
on the Crown
Dependencies
Pre-Budget report leads
to fear of scapegoating
By Daniel JuDge anD
Helen Burggraf
The UK Crown’s Dependencies
fear being made
scapegoats of the global
financial crisis following
Chancellor Alistair
Darling’s ‘attack’ on offshore
financial centres in
his PreBudget Report.
The Isle of Man, Jersey
and Guernsey have publicly
welcomed the review of
their financial supervision
and cooperation, along
with that of 14 overseas
territories. But privately
there are serious concerns
among their financial communities
that the Labour
government is using
populist politics to win
public support and deflect
Julius Baer unveils energy sector fund
Julius Baer, the Swissowned
banking and investment
firm, has launched an
Energy Transition Fund into
its Luxembourgdomiciled
Multistock fund umbrella.
The firm, which owns
Londonbased alternative
investment house and multimanager
GAM, said the
fund would invest across
the spectrum of energy sectors
and companies, with a
focus on four areas: energy
Darling: Pre-Budget criticism
attention elsewhere.
Gary Boal, managing
director of Isle of Manbased
actuarial firm, Boal
& Co, said: “We are feeling
victimised. If you look at
the figures you would find
the flow of money from offshore
centres gets recycled
into the City of London
and UK Exchequer.”
resources, fuel conversion,
power generation and
demand efficiency.
A spokesman for the
firm said: “Targeted sectors
are those that will benefit
from the trends and transitions
which will dominate
the energy market in years
to come across the entire
energy value chain.”
The firm’s spokesman
said examples of such
areas would include invest
Country profile 26-27
Bahrain How the
island kingdom
has managed to
escape much of
the turmoil that
is gripping other
financial centres
Business figures in Jersey
and Guernsey expressed
similar views. One said: “I
believe our regulations and
supervision are better than
the UK’s, but if someone is
playing politics that could
be unfortunate.”
A Treasury spokesman
said any country with a
small GDP and relatively
large financial sector was
at risk in the current climate,
highlighting Iceland’s
situation.
“We will look at the
way these places operate
as financial centres and
their financial supervision,”
he said. “We represent the
Crown Dependencies in
international relations. If
these places went bust, the
Continued on page 5
fuNd factS
Name: energy Transition fund
Annual mgt fee: 1.6%
Min investment: none
Currency: $ with € and sfr
share classes
ments in bio and synthetic
fuels, solar, nuclear,
water and wind energy,
clean coal and oil and gas
servicing equipment.
December 2008
Axa Isle of Man
loses row with
HMRC on DGTs
for over 90s
Axa Isle of Man has lost
the latest stage of its
longrunning battle with
HM Revenue & Customs
(HMRC) over discounted
gift trusts (DGT) for the
over 90s.
The High Court last
month favoured HMRC in
its appeal against a decision
by a Special Commissioner
of tax, who supported Axa’s
argument that someone
over 90 could establish a
DGT. The trusts pay a regular
income to the settlor,
the value of which is offset
against any inheritance tax
payable if the settlor dies
within seven years.
HMRC argued there is no
market to buy an income
stream from someone over
90 as they are uninsurable,
so there is little or no discount
against IHT in the
event of their death. The
court action centred around
a real case, that of the late
Marjorie Bower, who had
taken out an Axa Estate
Planning Bond.
A spokesman for Axa
said the company may
appeal against the decision:
“This issue has potential
implications for other
customers and, following
the High Court decision,
we will take some time to
consider all the options.”
Feature 34-36
IA Singapore
Investment Forum
asian advisers
flock to hear
market views from
the world’s leading
fund managers
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