All offshore banks must have an office in Antigua and Barbuda with at least an officer entitled to represent the bank, residing in the country, and working exclusively for the Bank on a permanent basis, that is, having a physical presence. At such office, all documents and information related to the bank must be kept in order to reflect the bank’s activities and its financial condition as well as the different accounting reports related to the appropriate areas with due diligence to reflect the good standing condition.

BRS has complied with all the requirements under the laws of Antigua and Barbuda since it was founded in 1996 having its permanent office in the city of Saint John’s with personnel residing in such place. The Bank maintains all the necessary documents and information evidencing the activities of the Bank, its financial statements and its good standing condition, as well as any information related to its transactions and investments.

Antigua and Barbuda has adhered to all the recommendations made by the G7 countries, particularly in the financial sector, so as to comply with international standards.

In 1998, the government of Antigua and Barbuda undertook a deep restructure by inspecting more than seventy then existing financial institutions on the islands, as a result of which more than 30 banks were closed for not complying with the required regulations.

In 2000, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), established by the G7 as an assessment entity of the Organization for Cooperation in Economic Development (OECD) acknowledged the cooperation made by Antigua and Barbuda in the prevention of money laundering, for complying with international regulations.

Besides with FSRC, another organization called Office of National Drug Control and Money Laundering Policy (ONDCP) has also delivered guidelines to be observed by financial institutions in order to collaborate with the provisions under the Money Laundering Prevention Act (MLP Act) (Money Laundering Prevention Act, MLP Act)recommendations included in the Money Laundering Guidelines (Money Laundering Guidelines).

Business with foreign shell banks

BRS takes reasonable measures to prevent providing services to shell banks, in accordance with the requirements under the Patriot Act of 2001 Patriot Act del año 2001.This means that BRS will not provide any banking services to any foreign bank outside the United States which does not have a place of business at a fixed address or which can only rely on an electronic address in a country where such bank is authorized to perform banking activities

A foreign bank must have the following characteristics:

• Employs one or more persons full time.
• Keeps operating records related to its banking activities.
• Is subject to inspections by the banking authority that approved the foreign bank to operate.

The general rule is that accounts related to high risk public figures are not allowed to be opened in this Bank.

In the event our institution has knowledge that the prospective customer is related to a leader of a foreign political party, either at present or in the past, being elected or not, or has taken a prominent position in the public administration of a government, or is a senior official of a major political party or a senior executive of a government-owned commercial enterprise, or is a family member or business partner having close contact either personally or professionally with high-ranked public officials, the institution has to comply with certain requirements. First of all, we shall confirm if the person is a public figure by checking through the public records and database. In case of being confirmed as positive, the directors of our Bank shall decide as to authorize or not to open an account with us.

To support this policy, we are implementing a computer system to detect unusual operations.

In order to fully comply with this requirement, our institution has acquired and set up software to monitor all operations, which permits a prompt access to any data from the Know Your Customer database, such as: statistical or operations data, solvency, list of shareholders, directors, signatories, commercial references, etc.

The Court of Antigua is the only authority that may order to lift bank secrecy in case the customer is under investigation for criminal actions related to money laundering or financing of terrorism, under the MLP Act.

Therefore, we safeguard confidentiality regarding banking information of our customers, except when there is an order issued by a court of competent jurisdiction due to a criminal offence.