Links with the past

Standing guard at the southern tip of the Iberian peninsula, Gibraltar has for centuries been a strategic, symbolic and welcoming profile at the gateway between Africa and Europe. Only ten miles of water separate Gibraltar from North Africa, and in many ways Gibraltar and its surrounding region represents an idealised Africa - Mosque in GibraltarAfrica without the heat, without the drought, without the sand and without the political instability. The modern name of Gibraltar comes from the name of the Berber leader - Tarik ibn Zeyad who took the Rock in 711AD and thus started the conquest of Iberia. Gibraltar is derived from Jebel Tarik - the mountain Tarik which forms the basic substance of the great Rock itself. Across the Straits lies the mountain of Jebel Musa in memory of another great Islamic war hero and these two peaks zealously supervise the busy interchange between the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. With Gibraltar acting as a springboard, the Moors went on to make the rest of Spain the westernmost province of Islam, and stayed on her soil for seven hundred years. The epoch left a golden mark on the Rock where libraries, universities, observatories and architecture flourished.

It also taught Gibraltar about the irrigation, gardens and the elements of romanticism - a forerunner of swirl, the quarter tone and the castanet. Gibraltar's former Islamic life still shines through the garrison architecture and provides an important contribution to Gibraltar's current happy multi-racial environment where all cultures, from the east or the west, are made to feel at home.

The private banks have brought to Gibraltar the expertise and quiet style of older Banking centres. They and their clients are able to benefit from the Commitment of the Government of Gibraltar to provide the infrastructure of legislation and administration necessary for a bank to be able to offer to clients a package of services designed to make investment through Gibraltar discrete, secure and cost effective, allowing the client to structure his affairs generally in a tax effective manner with the added benefit of residency where appropriate.

At the heart of private Banking in Gibraltar is the need to preserve the confidentiality of the client and his business. Equally the private banks recognise that their clients respect investment expertise and have confidence in the financial soundness of the Banking system.

The private banks in Gibraltar are licensed by the Financial Services Commission and are regulated to the standards of the European Union. The relationship between these private banks and the Banking Supervisor ensures that, while the prudential supervision of the banks is conducted to the highest standards, the confidentiality of client identity is respected.

In the best tradition of private Banking, services from the private banks to clients are tailor-made to the specific needs of the clients, in particular by the effective use of both common law and civil law solutions to financial planning. For example it is not unusual to have a structure of both foundations and private companies to hold the assets of the client deposited with the bank and for those assets to be invested in accordance with the instructions of the client or his advisor by the bank on a fiduciary basis in the name of the bank, more often than not in the Swiss bank of the client's choice.

The taxation regime in Gibraltar is designed to accommodate the client who needs residency but whose lifestyle means that he rarely has the chance to spend long in one place. Provision is made for officially agreed predetermination of annual tax liability for a person who has acquired appropriate residential property and, along with his tax status, the right to reside. Such status is not adversely affected by the conduct of business operations from Gibraltar using tax-exempt companies.