Malaysia Hotline: +603- 2141 8908
Certain
limited transactions in the British Virgin Islands are still subject to stamp
duty.The main application of the stamp duty legislation relates to transfers of
real estate, or transfers of shares in companies which own real estate. The
rate of stamp duty on such transactions varies according to the status of the
transferee; if the transferee is a Belonger, then stamp duty on land transfers
is assessed at 4%; if the transferee is a Non-Belonger, it is assessed at 12%.
The
legislation also includes a number of "rump" taxes that were imposed
many years ago and subsist only due to a lack of attention in relation to
updating legislation; the amounts involved are tiny, and are never enforced in
practice. For example, charterparties are technically subject to stamp duty at
a rate of 50¢ in the British Virgin Islands, but despite the flourishing
bareboat charter industry stamp duty is rarely if ever paid by charterers.
Separately,
the British Virgin Islands also imposes various documentary duties which are
described as being distinct from stamp duty on various classes of
instrument:Cheque duty is assessed at 10¢ on each negotiable instrument
(including traveller's cheques) presented for payment within the
Territory.Trust instruments are assessed with trust duty of US$100 (unless they
are charitable trusts or bare trusts).
The
reason for not referring to these documentary taxes as stamp duty was that
under the old International Business Companies Act (Cap 291), companies incorporated
under that Act were exempt from stamp duty, and so to retain the payment
obligations for those companies, they were referred to as 'cheque duty' and
'trust duty' respectively.
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us
If
you have further queries, please contact Tannet
24
hours Malaysia hotline：603-21418908;
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hours Hong Kong hotline：852-27837818;
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hours Hong Kong hotline：86-755-
36990589;
Email:
mytannet@gmail.com