Let’s look at some of the laws that this disappointing but frequently used jurisdiction has. But before we delve into this, let’s point out that the capital, Belize City, has a paved street that is 3 or 4 blocks long. You are in the third world here with numerous internet, power and phone outages. Belize is often hit by hurricanes. The stability of the regime in Belize is questionable as they had a regime change in recent years and the new regime did not honor economic citizenships and passports from the previous regime. Food to reflect on how things work in Belize. Also, in Belize, it’s usually a bank that just has an offshore license that can’t do business with residents of the country, isn’t that too reassuring? More details follow:
The Belize Money Laundering (Prevention) Act, 1996 defines money laundering (broadly, in our view) as:
Participate, directly or indirectly, in a transaction involving property that is the proceeds of crime, knowing or having reasonable grounds to believe that the same are the proceeds of crime; or receive, possess, manage, invest, conceal, disguise, dispose of, or bring into Belize any property that is the proceeds of crime, knowing or having reasonable grounds to believe that it is the proceeds of crime. Under Belizean law, money laundering is also considered an offense for the purposes of any law relating to the extradition or surrender of fugitive criminals.
The legislation establishes that any person who participates in or attempts to, aids, abets, advises or procures the commission of the crime of money laundering, or who conspires to commit it, is guilty of an offence. The foregoing also includes those persons who at the time of the commission of an offense acted in an official capacity for or on behalf of a group of persons (whether corporate or not) or purported to act in such a capacity. However, if such persons provide evidence showing that the crime was committed without their knowledge, consent or collusion, charges may be dropped.
The penalty imposed on those convicted of money laundering can be a fine, ranging from US$12,500 to US$50,000, or a prison sentence of 3 to 6 years, or a combination of fine and imprisonment.
The Act also makes it an offense to disclose facts or other information to another person that is likely to prejudice an investigation (think informing the subject of the investigation) by a person who knows or suspects that an investigation has been carried out. conduct a money laundering investigation, is being, or is about to be, punishable by a fine of not more than US$25,000, or by imprisonment for not more than 3 years, or both. So don’t expect any bank in Belize to tell you that someone is asking questions about your account.
The falsification, concealment, destruction or disposition of any document or material that may be relevant to a money laundering investigation or to any order issued pursuant to the provisions of this Act is punishable by a fine of not more than US$50,000 or with a custodial sentence of no more than 5 years, or both.
An application may be made to the Supreme Court of Belize to freeze the property of, or property in the possession or control of a person who has been charged or is about to be charged with a money laundering offence, wherever said goods are found. located, if the property is alleged to be the proceeds of crime, do you think a bank in Belize would want this to happen so they can keep your money for years to come charging interest and not paying interest?
After a person has been convicted of a money laundering offence, the court may order any property, proceeds or instrumentalities derived from, or connected or related to, such offense to be forfeited and disposed of in such manner as the Minister indicate. So if they say you laundered money, you lose your money. Sounds great, doesn’t it?
However, all prosecutions, actions, trials, or other proceedings brought for any crime, or for the recovery of fines, penalties, or forfeiture, must be made within 5 years from the date the crime was committed or the cause increased. Of action.
Reporting Requirements (It Gets Worse!)
In addition to reporting “suspicious transactions” to the Central Bank of Belize, which is required by law, Belize’s financial institutions adhere to the “know your customer” principle and also conduct the necessary due diligence exercises. This means that the bank in Belize has to tell you if you see something that they consider suspicious in their great wisdom and remember that if the government seizes the money it will probably stay in the bank for a few years charging interest for the bank. Think about the conflict of interest and remember that money laundering is far from being clearly defined in law, it is too broad in scope and can include whatever they want it to include.
The Act provides the following examples of “suspicious transactions”: ‘complex, unusual or large business transactions, unusual patterns of transactions, whether completed or not, all unusual transactions and significant but periodic transactions, which have no economic purpose or apparent legal. ‘ It seems to cover everything they want. What does a complex transaction or a large transaction mean anyway?
If financial institutions or their employees, staff, directors, owners or other authorized representatives knowingly fail to report such transactions or knowingly make a false or falsified report on such matters, they may be charged with a criminal offense. A financial penalty of not more than $25,000 may be imposed, and the license of such financial institutions may also be suspended or revoked, if found liable.
The Central Bank of Belize evaluates all reports of “suspicious transactions” and, upon concluding that there are reasonable grounds that a money laundering offense is being, has been, or is about to be committed, will refer such transactions to law enforcement authorities. law enforcement officers for investigation. and possible prosecution. Notice it says that if the Central Bank thinks a crime is about to be committed, it can preemptively strike and seize your money in case it thinks you intended to break the law one day, but haven’t yet. .
If there are reasonable grounds to believe that a contravention or breach of this Act may have occurred, the Central Bank also has the power to inspect any record of commercial transactions, ask any questions relevant to said record and take notes or take copies of any record. all or part of said record during the normal working hours of the financial institution, and may transmit the information to the authority in charge of enforcing the law. This means that there are no records of private companies in Belize.
International cooperation
Belize is a member of the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force, an organization of Caribbean states that have joined forces “to develop and share the latest intelligence on money laundering and other financial crime techniques used in the Caribbean region and in other places”. This organization works closely with the world’s leading anti-money laundering authority, the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering, whose principles Belize also subscribes to.
The legislation makes provisions for cooperation between the court or other competent authority of Belize and the court or other competent authority of another State in matters relating to money laundering offenses pursuant to the Belize Money Laundering (Prevention) Act. , 1996, and within the limits of the respective legal systems.
Belize is party to the 1988 United Nations Drug Convention and is a member of the Group of Experts for the Control of Money Laundering of the Inter-American Drug Abuse Control Commission (OAS/CICAD) of the Organization of United States. American people. The United States and Belize signed a Mutual Legal Assistance Treaty (MLAT) in September 2000. Belize also has a Tax Treaty with the US.
Belize does have Bearer Share Corporations, but they are not anonymous like Panama and function differently. Here again we see Belize laws full of loopholes to freely invade privacy. Company registration in Belize is through a registered agent, not an attorney, so forget about attorney-client privilege. The registered agent does due diligence to know the owner(s) of the corporation. The Belize Money Laundering Law and the Belize Code of Conduct require this release of identification. Now here come the loopholes. The only document filed for public record at the Registry of Corporations in Belize is the Memorandum and Articles of Incorporation. The Belize Financial Intelligence Unit and the Belize International Financial Services Commission are two organizations in Belize that have free access to corporate records, including property registered with the agent, and can obtain this information freely, no warrant is required. judicial and you will not know They once obtained your supposed confidential information and gave it to other countries that do who knows what with it. You are one small step away from being in a public database and the door for widespread fishing expeditions is wide open.
In Panama, plain and simple, there is no registry with any property registry for a corporation with bearer shares, so no one can access something that does not exist. It is true that the attorney who formed the corporation in Panama could be contacted, but this would require a serious court proceeding to violate attorney-client privilege, with many causes, and of course the attorney would have a duty to oppose such a court order. Panama has 400,000 corporations registered there, most of which will quickly go away if the courts violate privacy. Each corporation pays $300 a year in taxes, which adds up to $120,000,000 and this is for a country with 2.9 million people. The Panama Canal only brings Panama about $335,000,000 and requires 9,000 employees. How many people are required to manage a corporate registration department? Maybe 200. Panama is very unlikely to violate corporate privacy. The lawyer in Panama can only have knowledge of the person who formed the company, not of others to whom the corporation has been transferred since its formation. Such transfers do not need to be reported and the new owners do not need to be registered anywhere, they just need to hold the shares of the corporation physically. The new owners can reside outside of Panama, the new owners can be a corporation, foundation or trust in another country, etc. making the trails extremely difficult, time consuming, expensive, and generally not feasible for most people to follow, especially when you consider that no one really knows how many times ownership may have been transferred.
Does this sound like a jurisdiction you’d like to use for something? We consider Belize to be just a ridiculous jurisdiction with no guarantees or protections in place, avoid this one.