Company Secretarial Update (British Virgin Islands)

Following the commencement of the IBC (Amendment) Act 2003 and 2004, several significant changes in respect of BVI companies effective from 1 January 2005 are summarised below:

1. For companies incorporated on or after 1 January 2005, any bearer share certificates issued must be kept by the authorised or recognised custodian. For companies incorporated before 1 January 2005, they shall amend their Memorandum and Articles of Association to remove the clause(s) allowing the issuance of bearer shares by 31 December 2010. Otherwise these companies are also subject to the aforesaid custodian requirement and higher annual license fee.
   
   
2. Every company incorporated on or after 1 January 2005 must appoint first director(s) within 30 days of incorporation and a copy of the Register of Directors must be maintained at the registered office in BVI. This requirement is also applied to the existing BVI companies which must comply with this by 1 January 2006.
   
   
3. The annual license fee of a company with authorised share capital of USD50,000 or less will increase by USD50 while a company with authorised share capital of greater than USD50,000 will increase by USD100.