Intellectual property holding businesses (FOI)

​Request

The Taxation (Companies – Economic Substance) (Jersey) Law 2019 came into effect for the financial period after 1 January 2019.

How many companies were there in each of the financial years 2019 and 2020 that reported that their relevant activity was as an "intellectual property holding business" (IP), what were the names of those companies, and which one's were reported as a "high risk IP company"?

Response

The Taxation (Companies - Economic Substance) (Jersey) Law 2019 (ESL) came into effect for accounting periods starting after 1 January 2019.

Article 8 of the ESL only permits information gathered under the Law to be exchanged with specified competent authorities. It does not expressly allow the release of any other information either to scheduled authorities or to the general public.

As such the Comptroller is of the opinion that he cannot respond to this request and Article 29 (Other prohibitions or restrictions) of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011 has been applied.

Article applied

Article 29 - Other prohibitions or restrictions

Information is absolutely exempt information if the disclosure of the information by the scheduled public authority holding it –

(a) is prohibited by or under an enactment;

(b) is incompatible with a European Union or an international obligation that applies to Jersey; or

(c) would constitute or be punishable as a contempt of court.