The Nevis International Exempt Trust Ordinance: Scope, History and the Register of Trusts

Scope. This chapter introduces the Nevis International Exempt Trust Ordinance, the statute that governs every Nevis international trust. It describes how the Ordinance came to take its present form, how it is organized, what a trust must be to fall within it, and the register on which every international trust must be entered and kept. The substantive law of the Ordinance is examined in the chapters that follow: creation and validity in chapter 6, trustees in chapter 7, beneficiaries and spendthrift provisions in chapter 8, protectors and reserved powers in chapter 9, purpose and charitable trusts in chapter 10, and variation, migration and termination in chapter 11 (see infra chs. 6–11). The creditor-protection provisions, which are the reason most settlors choose Nevis, are examined in Part V (see infra chs. 21–25). This chapter is the map; those chapters are the territory.

The text cited. The Ordinance is cited in this treatise as the Nevis International Exempt Trust Ordinance, Cap. 7.03(N) (rev. ed. 2017), and in this chapter, after its first citation in each section, as "the Ordinance." The revised edition shows the law as at December 31, 2017. Nevis International Exempt Trust Ordinance, Cap. 7.03(N) (rev. ed. 2017). No amending Ordinance enacted after that date has been located. Regulations made in December 2024 to revise the fees recite section 64 of Cap. 7.03(N) as their authority, which confirms that the Ordinance in its revised form remains the statute in force. Nevis International Exempt Trust (Fees) (Amendment) Regulations, 2024, S.R.O. No. 12 of 2024 (N), pmbl. Chapter 2 explained how the revised editions are prepared and why a planner must also check the Gazette for later amendments (see supra ¶ 250).

Three ideas. Three ideas organize the Ordinance and recur throughout this volume.

1. Status by registration. A trust becomes an international trust only by being entered on the register and remains one only while its registration is renewed each year. The protections of the Ordinance attach to the status, and the status depends on the register (see infra ¶¶ 540, 560, 570).
2. An offshore, non-resident regime. The Ordinance serves settlors and beneficiaries who are not resident in St Christopher and Nevis, through a trustee that is a Nevis entity or a licensed Nevis professional, and over property that does not include land in the Federation. Its tax exemptions and its protective rules are offered on those terms (see infra ¶¶ 540, 550).
3. A self-contained code of protection. The Ordinance supplies its own rules on validity, governing law, fraudulent dispositions, limitation, foreign judgments and the creditor's bond, and excludes the general law where that law would weaken them (see infra ¶ 550). The Statute of Elizabeth does not apply. Nevis International Exempt Trust Ordinance, Cap. 7.03(N), § 55 (rev. ed. 2017).

The trust in the Nevis structure. The international trust is the senior entity in most Nevis structures. A typical structure places a Nevis limited liability company beneath the trust, with the trustee as the company's sole member or manager, and the company holds the investment accounts or operating interests (see infra ch. 30). The Ordinance anticipates that arrangement: a Nevis company, limited liability company or multiform foundation may be the trustee or a beneficiary of an international trust. Id. §§ 2, 34(5). The Ordinance is therefore one of three statutes, with the Limited Liability Company Ordinance and the Multiform Foundations Ordinance, that a planner must read together (see infra Parts III and IV).

Terminology. "International trust" means a trust that meets the definition in section 2 and is registered under the Ordinance (see infra ¶ 540). "Qualified foreign trust" means a trust governed by the law of another jurisdiction that is entered on the separate register kept for such trusts (see infra ¶ 560.03). "The registrar" is the officer appointed by the Minister responsible for finance in the Nevis Island Administration to keep the registers. "The Court" is the High Court of St Christopher and Nevis, sitting in the Nevis Circuit for these purposes (see supra ch. 3). "Dollars" means Eastern Caribbean dollars unless the text says otherwise; the Eastern Caribbean dollar is fixed at EC$2.70 to the United States dollar.

Plan of the chapter. Section 510 traces the history of the Ordinance from its enactment through the 2015 amendments and the revised edition, and explains the renumbering that confuses older sources. Section 520 sets out the architecture of the Ordinance. Section 530 examines the statutory definition of a trust and the definitions in section 2 on which the rest of the Ordinance depends. Section 540 analyses the three conditions that make a trust an international trust. Section 550 outlines the exempt status and the protective core. Sections 560 and 570 examine registration, renewal, fees, lapse and termination. Section 580 deals with confidentiality and the institutions that surround the Ordinance. Section 590 discusses In re Corona Trust, the leading reported decision of the Nevis High Court on the Ordinance, and closes with a checklist for registering and maintaining an international trust.