High praise for Guernsey from funds expert

Offshore banking wealth management in Guernsey is facing potentially wide-ranging regulatory changes, an expert has said.

Christopher Gambrell, managing director of financial services group Praxis, also suggested that fund managers could become increasingly attracted to Guernsey in future.

Tighter financial regulation of private wealth management in the wake of the credit crunch has been a consistent theme of both national and international authorities.

A general strengthening of the regulatory framework was proposed in the Financial Services Authority’s Turner Review earlier this year, while increased offshore controls were specifically cited by the G20 summit agreement in March.

In an interview with HFMWeek, Mr Gambrell said: ’It is widely anticipated that some of the issues that contributed to the [financial] crisis will be subject to increased regulation.

’I suspect that industry professionals will look to well-regulated jurisdictions in order to domicile funds in the future. In this context, Guernsey has weathered the storm in good shape … [it] has complied with its international obligations in terms of anti-money laundering and the signing of tax exchange agreements.

Mr Gambrell also suggested that Guernsey would ’increase its market share’ as a domicile for investment funds - and that the hedge fund sector would provide a particularly fruitful area for growth.ADNFCR-2318-ID-19218720-ADNFCR