Seychelles

Seychelles is an island located in East Africa, in the Indian Ocean. It is constituted by 115 islands bordering the northwest with Madagascar. Seychelles is also a Commonwealth country and achieved independence from the United Kingdom in 1976. Seychelles is an offshore jurisdiction and the main advantage of the country is the geographical location hence it is a specialized jurisdiction in the import and export of products between Africa, Asia and Europe.

General information

Taxes for non-residents in Seychelles

Seychelles maintains favorable tax laws for foreign investment in the country. It is the best African tax haven and does not oblige to pay taxes to natural and legal persons that do not reside in the country and whose incomes don´t not come from its territory. Investors who decide to open a bank account or register a company in Seychelles will not pay taxes such as rent, corporation taxes, VAT, inheritance, donations and will not suffer the dreaded tax deductions for subsequent years. Investors who decide to invest in Seychelles and repatriate the money to their country of residence can save taxes through double taxation agreements.

Characteristics of Seychelles Companies

Financial system in Seychelles

Automatic information exchange in Seychelles 

Seychelles has signed the automatic exchange of information treaty that has entered into force on January 1 of 2018. Also the country has signed 36 bilateral automatic exchange agreements. 

The signatory countries of the agreement

The treaty of automatic exchange of information does not affect the fiscal status of the country, that is, if the tax laws in Seychelles establish that people and non-resident companies pay 0% of taxes, the signing of the treaty will not make it pay taxes in Seychelles The treaty of automatic exchange of information is presenting many problems between countries since it is NOT a treaty in which automatic information will be reported to each other or all to all, that is, each country will have to sign a bilateral information agreement automatically with another country. What does this mean? If, for example, Andorra is interested in exchanging information with Seychelles but Seychelles is not interested in reporting information to Andorra, there will be NO information exchange and clients privacy will be protected. Currently, 20-04-2018 Seychelles has signed 36 bilateral treaties to automatically exchange information. You can see the updated list of countries that have signed bilateral agreements to exchange information automatically with each other.

The bilateral agreements with Seychelles

The countries most affected by the signature of the automatic exchange of information treaties are going to be the countries of high taxation and not the offshore jurisdictions. It is expected that high tax countries sign bilateral agreements with each other with the corresponding problem that these have: competition in investments, tax competition and abandonment of investments in other jurisdictions by countries with lower or no taxation allowing legal repatriation of them to the country of fiscal residence.

Using offshore jurisdictions what can be achieved is a reduction and postponement of tax payments. As a general rule high-tax countries force natural and legal persons to declare all the world's income. But what happens when you have an offshore company and you do not divide dividends or have gone bankrupt? For example, a person has a company and account in Seychelles, the company has generated annual benefits and the final beneficiary doesn’t want to repatriate them to his country of residence. So what happens? The answer is very simple: there will not be any kind of tax payment until the benefits obtained from Seychelles reach the territory of a tax residence of the final beneficiary. Therefore, if you are required to report benefits obtained from abroad, it is advisable to inform your tax agency so when you will be offered a tax advantage in your country of residence to repatriate them.

Advantages of Seychelles

Seychelles is one of the best offshore jurisdictions to invest for the following reasons: 

• There is no need to pay any kind of tax. 
• Legal security guaranteed by law. 
• Privacy. 
• Specialized jurisdiction in Forex and stock market. 
• Good telecommunications infrastructure. 
• Little bureaucracy when it comes to obtaining financial licenses, companies formation and bank accounts opening. 
• There is no restriction by nationality. 
• Excellent geographical location. 
• Economically stable financial center.