India finance links ‘still strong’

Tuesday 22nd March 2011, 11:30AM GMT.

Jersey Finance chief executive Geoff Cook

BUSINESS opportunities with India will remain strong despite an important tax agreement not being signed, Jersey Finance said today.

Representatives of the organisation which promotes the Island’s finance industry around the world, senior politicians and leading industry figures are visiting the region to promote Jersey. However, because of delays in the preparation of one of the contracts, the Tax Information Exchange Agreement has not been signed.

Despite the setback, Jersey Finance believes that it will not cause problems between Jersey and India and remains positive that a healthy future relationship is still possible.

The chief executive of Jersey Finance, Geoff Cook, said: ‘Agreements like these take a number of months to prepare, so it is understandable that on this occasion the formal signing could not be completed to coincide with our visit to India.’

‘We have every confidence that the agreement will soon be in place, and when it is, the platform for growing business between Jersey and India will be strengthened further.’

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1
WB

March 22, 2011 at 1:57 pm

‘Agreements like these take a number of months to prepare, so it is understandable that on this occasion the formal signing could not be completed to coincide with our visit to India.’

I will make sure to use this argument when handing in my tax return late this year.

Come on this is a botch job plain and simple – cut the spin.

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2
Gary

March 22, 2011 at 3:51 pm

The truth is that India has taken a hard-line stance with regard to tax havens. As they are losing billions of taxable income to offshore financial centres, they are lobbying the OECD to widen the scope of these exchange of tax information agreements. Hence, they refuse to sign the current form of the agreement (how or why that info was not conveyed to the those who drafted the agreement in Jersey is a question I would like to have answered).

The other question that has to be raised is did anyone consider India’s attitude to offshore financial centres before deciding to open up an office there? I may be wrong, but perhaps this is another reason why India refused to enter into the agreement.

Any thoughts, Geoff?

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3
Sample Agreements

March 23, 2011 at 6:38 am

Agreements

Nice post on indian finance, i think you are eagerly waiting for an agreement between india and Jersy.

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4
Adrian

March 23, 2011 at 7:50 pm

Does India give a stuff about a 9×5 rock in the English Channel?

I would say not.

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5
David

March 24, 2011 at 3:14 am

The Cayman Islands signed a TIEA with India this week.

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6
noah

March 28, 2011 at 5:00 pm

Today india asked jersey to help in an investigation.
looks like some of that dirty money is in jerseys squeaky clean finance industry.
surely not every penny is vetted

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