On/offshore convergence

Do you think the regulatory requirements between jurisdictions – both on and offshore – will narrow? Will there be growing convergence between onshore and offshore documents and regulation of funds?

“There will always be differences between the approaches,” prosaically comments Henry Smith in the Cayman Islands office of Maples and Calder. Offshore hedge funds and their main service providers are already well regulated in the leading jurisdictions, he points out. “The success of the Cayman model means that other offshore jurisdictions gravitate towards a similar model. This does lead to a degree of convergence of regulation among the offshore jurisdictions,” he says.

However, Cayman Island