BVI vehicles in transactions, virtual assets business and structures used in Asia
May 2024
Agenda
• Introduction and about me
• Advantages of BVI structures shown through real-world examples
• How BVI works for the digital economy
Real estate holding structure
BVI Co Investment fund HK Co PRC co
Onshore
Offshore
Advantages
• Tax neutrality
• But there are more subtle advantages
• Investor and lender familiarity
• Ecosystem of service providers
• Common law legal system and flexible corporate law
Investor and lender familiarity
• BVI vehicles can be used for the entire lifecycle of a business, from incorporation to early-stage capital raising and beyond
• APAC banks and investors are familiar with BVI vehicles and happy to lend / invest
• Section 66(4) BCA
Common law legal system and flexible corporate law
• Common law legal system
• Ultimate appeal to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in the UK
• Important to lenders, investors, counterparties and HNW individuals who can be confident their legal and property rights will be respected and, if needed, enforced
• Flexible corporate law facilitates transactions
The new economy
• The fundamentals remain but new use cases emerging
• ESOP for regional logistics business
• DeFi and Web 3 startups
• Decentralised Autonomous Organization (DAO)
• Virtual assets
The new economy (cont’d)
• BUIDL BlackRock tokenized fund
• Captured almost 30% of the $1.3 billion tokenized Treasury market in just six weeks - CoinDesk
• BVI fund issuing BUIDL token on the Ethereum (ETH) network and backed by U.S. Treasury bills, repo agreements and cash
• Potential benefits include faster, around-the-clock settlements, increased operational efficiency and greater transparency
This presentation is only accurate to 17 May 2024. The information within this presentation is provided for general guidance only, is not intended to be comprehensive and does not constitute legal advice or give rise to an attorney-client relationship.
Specialist legal advice should be taken in relation to specific circumstances. If you require legal advice, please reach out to your usual Maples and Calder contact.
Published by Maples and Calder (Hong Kong) LLP
May 2024 © MAPLES GROUP
