The Guernsey Quarterly Trust Update
Welcome
Happy New Year and welcome to this year's first instalment of our Guernsey Quarterly Trust Update, where we take a look back at the developments from Q.4 of 2018.
We start by reviewing the Royal Court of Jersey's decision on a case, whereby a blessing application was made by a trustee who wanted to sell the sole asset of a trust in order to satisfy creditors including, importantly, its own fees.
We also consider the Privy Council decision in Gany Holdings (PTC) SA v Khan and others; Rangoonwala v Khan and others [2018] UKPC 21, which relates to an appeal from the Court of Appeal of the British Virgin Islands to the Privy Council. The case provides a cautionary tale on the importance of ensuring transfers of assets into a trust are properly documented.
We also provide a re-fresher on the doctrine of mistake which is often confused with the rule in Hastings-Bass which has had somewhat of a year in the spotlight in 2018 with the two decisions in M v St Anne's Trustees Limited.
The end of the 2018 quarter also marked Guernsey's new substance requirements for companies tax resident in Guernsey. We take a look at the new legislation, which took effect on 1st January 2019, and what this means for trusts and corporate trustees.
Finally looking forward to 2019, our non-contentious team have re-vamped their approach to pricing standard trust and foundation documents. For those who missed the news release, see here for our new user friendly pricing guide which has come into effect this month.
We hope you enjoy this instalment.
The Guernsey Trust Team
