On the 1st October 2019 two amendments to Cayman company legislation came into effect as the registers maintained by the Cayman General Registry are opened to limited public inspection. On the payment of a fee the public can now obtain details of the current directors and managers of Cayman companies.
With the coming into effect of the Companies Law (2018 Revision) the new section 55A, introduced by the Companies (Amendment) Law 2019, provides that the public has access to inspect the General Registry list of the current directors of Cayman companies and obtain their full names. The public can obtain similar information on alternate directors, should the company have any appointed.
The list of current managers of Cayman limited liability companies has also been opened to public inspection in a similar move. The change was introduced by a new section 34A inserted into the Limited Liability Companies Law (2018 Revision) by the 2019 Limited Liability Companies(Amendment) Law 2019.
The two changes increases the transparency of Cayman companies as part of the continuing global movement towards open governance, however, the legislation includes important safeguards.
Only the directors’ and managers’ full names will be disclosed, the public will not have access to the individuals’ addresses. The details held by the General Registry of previous directors and other historic information of those directors is also not open to public inspection and will remain confidential.
All requests for information must be made giving the company’s name, with the aim of preventing general searches or fishing expeditions being made to discover which or how many companies a director or manager may have been appointed to serve.
Access to the registered information will not be made available on-line and can only be obtained by individual attendance at the Registry. Furthermore, the Registry will not provide a copy or extract of the information, the applicant being allowed only to take notes from the Register. A fee of CI$50 (approximately US$61) is payable.
For more information, please contact Simon Huxford at s.huxford@rosemont-mc.com