British Virgin Islands—cross border banking and finance guide

Copyright © 2025 LexisNexis
Produced in partnership with Tiffany Tolliss of Ogier and Christian Burns-Di Lauro of Ogier
Practice notes

British Virgin Islands—cross border banking and finance guide

Copyright © 2025 LexisNexis

Produced in partnership with Tiffany Tolliss of Ogier and Christian Burns-Di Lauro of Ogier

Practice notes
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Loan market and developments

Please provide a brief overview of the current state of the loan markets in your jurisdiction and any significant recent market developments

The British Virgin Islands (BVI) does not have a commercial loan market as such and any Lending into the Territory that forms the subject of this guide would be provided by a non-BVI lender.

Typically a BVI company acting as a borrower would borrow from any of the world's major financial centres and would also utilise its facilities outside the BVI. Currently the bulk of the lending that the jurisdiction is seeing is provided by European, Asian and North American lenders.

Balance sheet lending and asset finance have historically been the largest sectors for the jurisdiction, but global market conditions have also seen a marked increase in restructurings and work-outs.

Please provide a brief overview of forthcoming changes to the law or other matters that may affect the loan markets or the responses to the questions below

There have been a number

Tiffany Tolliss
Tiffany Tolliss

Senior Associate, Ogier

Tiffany is a corporate lawyer who has practised in the UK, Jersey and the British Virgin Islands. She is a senior member of the BVI transactional team at Ogier and advises on a broad range of British Virgin Islands corporate, finance, funds and restructuring matters with a focus on mergers and acquisitions, debt finance and the formation, launch and ongoing maintenance of investment funds.

Tiffany's wide-ranging practice includes representing financial institutions and organisations advising on the British Virgin Islands law aspects of banking, finance and restructuring transactions.

Tiffany also covers all aspects of BVI funds formation and frequently advises investment managers, funds and financial services providers on BVI legal and regulatory matters.

Tiffany is also part of Ogier's multi-disciplinary Restructuring and Insolvency team, with experience in refinancings, corporate restructuring and reorganisations and member and creditor schemes of arrangement. Her achievements include working on a BVI scheme of arrangement for a debt restructuring, which formed part of a US$1.5 billion global restructuring for a Brazilian-headquartered oil and gas drilling group.

Before joining Ogier in 2017, Tiffany was part of the Corporate team at Browne Jacobson in Birmingham. Tiffany is a law graduate of the University of Birmingham and completed her Legal Practice Course at the University of Law. She is a member of the Law Society of England and Wales and qualified as an English Solicitor in 2016. She was also admitted as a British Virgin Islands legal practitioner in 2019.

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Christian Burns-Di Lauro
Christian Burns-Di Lauro

Partner, Ogier

Christian is a partner within Ogier's Banking and Finance service line, specialising in all aspects of finance, security and restructuring from a British Virgin Islands law perspective.

He represents a wide range of financial institutions and organisations advising on the British Virgin Islands law aspects of banking, finance and restructuring transactions.

He has practiced in London, Jersey, the Cayman Islands and the British Virgin Islands, has a holistic approach to cross-jurisdictional offshore legal advice and is well placed to draw on this experience to add greater value to clients and intermediaries working across multiple jurisdictions.

Christian is part of Ogier's multi-disciplinary Restructuring and Insolvency and Private Equity teams. He specialises in advice in relation to refinancing, security enforcement, corporate restructuring and reorganisation and subscription credit and capital call facilities entered into by funds, with experience in formal insolvency procedures and providing advice in relation to enforcement options for creditors.

Before joining Ogier in 2014, he worked as a finance associate in the London office of Addleshaw Goddard LLP (including client secondments with The Royal Bank of Scotland plc and Diageo's Africa legal team).
Christian gained his LLB Hons from the University of Exeter in 2005 and is a member of The Law Society of England and Wales and qualified as an English Solicitor in 2010. He was also admitted as a British Virgin Islands legal practitioner in 2017.

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Jurisdiction(s):
United Kingdom
Key definition:
Lending definition
What does Lending mean?

The lending of copies of the work available for use, on terms that it will or may be returned.

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