March 22, 2017

Belize law compared to other offshore trust asset protection laws has some interesting aspects. Most offshore laws allow a creditor a certain period (typically 2 or more years) to bring a case in court to show that the assets that were transferred into the trust were fraudulent transfers.
Although asset protection counsel should weed out any clients who want to engage in any fraudulent transfers, and therefore should not put themselves into the likely position of losing a fraudulent transfer claim against the client in the offshore court, Belize law at least removes the time, cost and effort of having to defend against (although meritless) fraudulent transfer claims regarding a Belize trust. Instead Belize law simply provides that no such claim can be brought against transfers to the Belize trust.

Another distinction under Belize law as compared to most other offshore jurisdictions is that the Belize courts will not entertain a freeze order against trust assets. These freeze orders are used in other jurisdictions as an attack by the creditor, also called a Mareva injunction, to stop the trust from paying for a client’s legal defense and other use of trust funds.

These are examples of how Belize is strengthening its position in the international landscape as a place to set up very protective structures. In fact, Belize also has superior LLC protective law. Belize in general is very cutting-edge in its approaches to planning possibilities, and is one of the most protective jurisdictions in the world.

–Edward D. Brown, Esq., CPA, LLM