NEWS CENTRE

The Immigration Department will soon have the power to issue Special entry permits to people of high net worth who want to work in Barbados.

CEO of Invest Barbados, Wayne Kirton expects that by late this month this country will be fully compliant with both Phase one and Phase two of the Global Peer Review regulations.

Barbados has kept its “high creditworthiness” rating from the Caribbean Information and Credit Rating Services Limited (CariCRIS), despite Government debt being put at just above junk status by Standard & Poors (S&P) last November.

Bermuda’s decision to seek equivalency with the new European Union Solvency II requirements harmonising insurance regulations will make the island “obsolete” as an off-shore domicile says an American industry veteran.

In the 2005/06 government financial year, the Caymanian Immigration Department recorded a total of $33.4 million in revenues collected between 1 July, 2005, and 30 June, 2006. By the end of the 2010/11 budget year on 30 June, 2011, revenues have increased to $70.2 million.

Leaders from Caribbean nations and the United Kingdom agreed at the end of a two-day summit an action plan to establish “‘a new and improved strategic partnership to promote prosperity”. Importantly, the UK government committed to reopen negotiations to mitigate the impact of the UK’s air travel tax on Caribbean territories.

US and international accounting regulators have agreed to look into reducing the differences between their respective classification and measurement models for financial instruments.

The US Financial Accounting Standards Board and the International Accounting Standards Board said on Friday that they will jointly look at ways to align the key aspects of their models as part of separate reviews into their standards.

The IASB will consider aligning its standards as part of a “limited-scope” review of IFRS 9, while the FASB will consider changes as part of its ongoing re-deliberation of its own financial instruments standard, which was issued in May 2010.

United States President Barack Obama has announced that he will put forward new tax proposals in the coming weeks designed to reward companies that choose to invest or bring back jobs to the United States, and to eliminate tax advantages for companies moving jobs overseas.

While the President did not elaborate on the proposed tax measures, they are expected to form part of the 2013 federal budget blueprint, which is due to be sent to Congress during the first week in February.

The United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has reopened the offshore voluntary disclosure program after reporting continued strong interest in the scheme from taxpayers and tax practitioners following the closure of two previous initiatives.

The third offshore program comes as the IRS continues working on a wide range of international tax issues, particularly in the area of compliance, and will remain open for an indefinite period until otherwise announced.

Opinion is divided on whether such amnesty schemes achieve higher rates of tax compliance among those with offshore financial arrangements.