Bahamas On Track For OECD Tax Transparency Goal

by Phillip Morton, Investors Offshore.com

Tuesday, January 05, 2010

The Bahamas government has announced that that it has now concluded Tax Information Exchange Agreements (TIEAs) with 23 countries, and is expected to be recognized by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) as a territory that has exceeded the 12 agreement threshold by the March 2010 deadline set by the G20.

To date, The Bahamas has signed 10 TIEAs with the following countries: the United States, Monaco, San Marino, the United Kingdom, New Zealand, the Netherlands, China, Argentina, Belgium and France.

Negotiations for further agreements, which have not yet been ratified, have been achieved with Germany, Canada, Spain, Mexico, Australia, South Africa, South Korea, and the seven Nordic countries of Norway, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Iceland, Greenland and Faroe Islands.

The government has further noted that it is actively participating in discussions on the regulation of international financial services. In September of this year, the Bahamas was elected to membership of the OECD Peer Review Group, a group comprising members of a revamped OECD Global Forum.

The Peer Review Group is responsible for developing a programme of peer reviews to monitor progress of the implementation of the tax information exchange standards among the 90-plus members of the OECD Global Forum. The Group also monitors this progress in identified international financial centres that are not currently members of the Global Forum.

The government’s statement emphasizes its wish to safeguard its financial services sector, recognizing its value to the territory’s economy, and stating that it will continue to implement evolving standards to ensure that the Bahamas remains a well-regulated jurisdiction.