Linklaters LLP is a British multinational law firm, headquartered in London, England. Founded in 1838, it is a member of the "Magic Circle" of elite London-headquartered law firms. It currently employs over 3100 lawyers across 31 offices in 21 countries.
Clifford Chance LLP is a British multinational law firm headquartered in London, England, and a member of the "Magic Circle", a group of London-based multinational law firms. Clifford Chance is the largest law firm headquartered in the UK by revenue, having a total revenue of £2.04 billion in 2022–2023. It ranks as one of top ten largest law firms in the world measured both by number of lawyers and revenue with profits per equity partner exceeding £2 million.
"The Magic Circle" is an informal term describing the five most prestigious London-headquartered multinational law firms, which generally outperform the rest of the London law firms on profitability. The term has also been used to describe the most prestigious barristers' chambers in London. All of the 'Magic Circle' law firms and barristers' chambers specialise primarily in corporate law.
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP is a British multinational law firm headquartered in London, England, and a member of the Magic Circle. The firm has 28 offices in 17 jurisdictions across Asia, Europe, the Middle East and North America. It advises national and multinational corporations, financial institutions and governments.
Offshore investment is the keeping of money in a jurisdiction other than one's country of residence. Offshore jurisdictions are used to pay less tax in many countries by large and small-scale investors. Poorly regulated offshore domiciles have served historically as havens for tax evasion, money laundering, or to conceal or protect illegally acquired money from law enforcement in the investor's country. However, the modern, well-regulated offshore centres allow legitimate investors to take advantage of higher rates of return or lower rates of tax on that return offered by operating via such domiciles. The advantage to offshore investment is that such operations are both legal and less costly than those offered in the investor's country—or "onshore".
Maples Group is a multi-jurisdictional firm providing legal and financial services, headquartered in the Cayman Islands. It has offices in many financial centres around the world, including several tax neutral jurisdictions. Its law firm is a member of the offshore magic circle, and specialises in advising on the laws of the Cayman Islands, Ireland, Luxembourg, Jersey and the British Virgin Islands, across a range of legal services including commercial litigation, intellectual property, sport, and finance, in which the firm has a focus on the structuring of tax efficient legal structures.
The offshore magic circle is the set of the largest multi-jurisdictional law firms who specialise in offshore financial centres, especially the laws of the British Overseas Territories of Bermuda, Cayman Islands, and British Virgin Islands, and the Crown dependencies of Jersey and Guernsey.
Appleby is a leading offshore legal services provider.
The Silver Circle is a group of elite corporate law firms headquartered in London that has evolved significantly as the UK legal market has been affected by globalisation and mergers. The law firms generally described by The Lawyer magazine as comprising the Silver Circle were historically Ashurst, Herbert Smith, Macfarlanes, SJ Berwin and Travers Smith.
The Big Six is a term that traditionally referred to the six largest Australian law firms, as assessed by revenue and lawyer head count. From the mid-1980s, the phrase was in regular use to distinguish the largest Australian firms, collectively, from their smaller competitors. While informal, it was a widely-used descriptor, appearing in news items, industry commentary and scholarly articles.
Walkers is a Cayman Islands headquartered offshore law firm. Walkers provides legal, corporate, compliance and fiduciary services to global corporations, financial institutions, capital markets participants and investment fund managers. Walkers practices the laws of six jurisdictions from ten offices globally. It is a member of the offshore magic circle.
A tax haven is a term, sometimes used negatively and for political reasons, to describe a place with very low tax rates for non-domiciled investors, even if the official rates may be higher.
Mossack Fonseca & Co. was a Panamanian law firm and corporate service provider. At one time it was the world's fourth-largest provider of offshore financial services. From its 1977 foundation until the April 2016 publication of the Panama Papers, it remained mostly obscure, even though it sat at the heart of the global offshore industry and acted for about 300,000 companies. More than half were registered in British tax havens, as well as in the United Kingdom.
Maitland(a part of Apex Group) is a privately-owned investment holding company. In 2021, its Private and Corporate Client Services business was acquired by Stonehage Fleming and in 2022 its Fund and ManCo business was acquired by Apex Group.
Ocorian is a provider of trust, administration and fiduciary services for companies, institutions, individuals and funds. The company has connections to the offshore magic circle. It was founded in Jersey as law firm Bedell Cristin, with Bedell Trust providing financial services.
Conduit OFC and sink OFC is an empirical quantitative method of classifying corporate tax havens, offshore financial centres (OFCs) and tax havens.
Ireland has been labelled as a tax haven or corporate tax haven in multiple financial reports, an allegation which the state has rejected in response. Ireland is on all academic "tax haven lists", including the § Leaders in tax haven research, and tax NGOs. Ireland does not meet the 1998 OECD definition of a tax haven, but no OECD member, including Switzerland, ever met this definition; only Trinidad & Tobago met it in 2017. Similarly, no EU–28 country is amongst the 64 listed in the 2017 EU tax haven blacklist and greylist. In September 2016, Brazil became the first G20 country to "blacklist" Ireland as a tax haven.
Qualifying Investor Alternative Investment Fund or QIAIF is a Central Bank of Ireland regulatory classification established in 2013 for Ireland's five tax-free legal structures for holding assets. The Irish Collective Asset-management Vehicle or ICAV is the most popular of the five Irish QIAIF structures, it is the main tax-free structure for foreign investors holding Irish assets.
