03/05/19

CROWN DEPENDENCIES: Jersey's regulator gets top ratings under new standards.

As published on internationalinvestment.net, Thursday 2^nd May, 2019.

Jersey's financial regulator has received top ratings for its trust company oversight following the first evaluation of its kind by the Group of International Finance Centre Supervisors (GIFCS).

Jersey was the first international finance centre to be assessed under the GIFCS Standard for Regulation of Trust and Company Service Providers, with the JFSC awarded the top two ratings for the ten areas that were assessed.

These included licensing, corporate governance, controllers of TCSPs, Key Persons and other employees, control over vehicles, conduct, prudential, administration, financial crime and international sanction, and cooperation.

This can only lead to higher standards of international regulation among other finance centres and we are committed to working with other jurisdictions to achieve this"

The evaluation made a small number of recommendations to improve the JFSC's existing practices, some of which the regulator has already acted upon or is in the process of doing so.

As a founder member of the GIFCS, we felt it was important to lead the way and support the process. We are pleased we received positive ratings and were able to assist the GIFCS in setting a standard for future evaluations. We have already made most of the minor regulatory enhancements following our evaluation and these have been recognised by the assessors in their report," Martin Moloney, JFSC Director General, said in a statement.

"Other jurisdictions are now able to use the GIFCS standards and our evaluation to make changes to their regimes ahead of their assessments. This can only lead to higher standards of international regulation among other finance centres and we are committed to working with other jurisdictions to achieve this," he added.

John Aspden, chairman of the GIFCS, said: "Having issued the Standard, the GIFCS was keen to commence peer group evaluations of members' compliance and acknowledges Jersey's willingness to take this important step in starting the evaluations process. It shows how the Standard can provide the framework for a credible supervisory regime and in relation to a business sector which clearly benefits from demonstrating compliance with principles of good behaviour and administration."

There are a further 18 GIFCS members, and those which undertake TCSP activity will undergo the same assessment over a period of time. A representative from the JFSC will be an assessor for one of the next evaluations taking place in 2019.