The Nevis Asset Protection Trust

In previous posts I have discussed setting up a trust to protect your assets from future litigants and potential creditors or judgments against you. One asset protection trust that offers protections that other jurisdictions do not provide is the Nevis International Exempt Trust.

One of the concerns with transferring your assets to a trust is that future litigants could bring court proceedings to try and set aside the trust in order to get access to the assets in the trust. Under Nevis law, the Nevis International Exempt Trust has several requirements that make this difficult. I have listed a summary of those requirements below.

1. A creditor must first pay a bond of $US 100,000.00 to the Minister of Finance in Nevis, before bringing any legal proceeding against a trust and before a court will consider it.

2. The burden of proof is on the complainant to establish their claim “beyond reasonable doubt”. This is a very high standard of proof.

3. No action or proceeding to set aside the settlement of the trust or by any person claiming to have had an interest in the trust assets before they were settled in the trust will be entertained by the court if the action or proceeding is commenced two years after the settlement of the trust.

The trust must meet the following criteria in order to qualify as a Nevis International Exempt Trust:

1. At least one of the Trustees must be a trust company licensed by the Government of Nevis to carry on a trust business in Nevis , or a corporation incorporated under the Nevis Business Corporation Ordinance.

2. The Settlor and the Beneficiaries must be non-residents of Nevis at all times.

3. The trust property must not include any land in the Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis.

Provided the assets are located outside of Canada (or whatever your home country jurisdiction is) a Nevis International Exempt Trust provides a higher level of asset protection against creditor attacks than in other jurisdictions.