The Cayman Islands government has published draft proposals to create a centrally held register of beneficial ownership, replacing the current system in which companies themselves keep records of their controlling persons.

The proposals will fulfil the island's 2019 commitment to introduce the central register by 2023. The jurisdiction has since 2017 required companies, limited liability companies and limited liability partnerships to keep records of their beneficial owners and make them available on request to the government's General Registry, but only for specific purposes and specific parties such as UK law enforcement. Currently, the public only have access to the entity's current directors, registered office, the nature of its business and the date of its financial year-end.

However, public registers are expected to become an international regulatory standard within two years, and the Cayman Islands and several other British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies, including Bermuda, have undertaken to follow suit. Moreover, the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force's enhanced follow-up report of February 2021 gave the Cayman Islands until January 2022 to legislate 'adequate and effective sanctions in cases where relevant parties (including legal persons) do not file accurate, adequate and up-to-date beneficial ownership information in line with those requirements'. This has prompted the Cayman Islands government into a wide-ranging review of its beneficial ownership regime, as well as the public central register...