If the primary rationale for the creation of trusts is their utility as vehicles for the devolution of family and commercial wealth, then trust planning in Asia should be becoming increasingly important with the ascent of Asia as a centre of global wealth. China and Japan represent two of the world’s largest four economies, the former alone now having an estimated 450,000 USD millionaires; India and Indonesia are also significant markets with wealth heavily concentrated in a developing class of globally wealthy entrepreneurs. While the growing concentration of private wealth in Asia might naturally lead to trust planning in any event, the strong desire to retain assets in family hands, found in many Asian cultures, makes the trust concept one that ideally suits many Asian families.

Trusts are a feature of the jurisprudence of a number of Asian jurisdictions, although in some countries their usage is more in the commercial, rather than the family, context. In this overview, we consider the trust laws in a number of Asian jurisdictions, showing that across Asia the full range of trust laws can be found.

Hong Kong and Singapore

Notwithstanding the return of Hong Kong to Chinese sovereignty, Hong Kong law remains, in large part, based upon English law. The Hong Kong trust law is contained in the Trustee Ordinance, Chapter 29 of the Laws of Hong Kong. This 1934 statute (which was amended to modernise the previous common law rule against perpetuities in 1970 by the Perpetuities and Accumulations Ordinance) is based on the English Trustee Act 1925 (a statute now largely superseded in England by the Trustee Act 2000)...