The trust concept in its various forms
Posted: Wed Feb 19, 2025 10:32 am
The original trust concept is widely believed to have originated under Common Law in the 12th century when the English knights were leaving for the crusades and needed the ability to confer the authority to act on their behalf in respect of their assets whilst separating the legal ownership of those assets.
The concept can in fact be traced back even earlier to Roman Civil law with the concepts of fideicommissum and fiducia both of which effectively conferred title to an individual’s assets to a third party in return for obligations on the third party as to how those assets were to be applied.
Continued as a means of passing value across the generations until the late 20th century malaysia mobile database when use of the Common Law form of trust started to branch away from pure estate-planning and the ‘trust’ became more of a tax-planning tool for (relatively) short-term gains for both corporates as well as individuals.
This particular modus operandi was embraced by certain aspects of the legal profession and the newly nascent offshore / international finance centres and the industry blossomed throughout the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s attracting the interest of the various revenue services who could see their flow of funds being diverted.
The concept can in fact be traced back even earlier to Roman Civil law with the concepts of fideicommissum and fiducia both of which effectively conferred title to an individual’s assets to a third party in return for obligations on the third party as to how those assets were to be applied.
Continued as a means of passing value across the generations until the late 20th century malaysia mobile database when use of the Common Law form of trust started to branch away from pure estate-planning and the ‘trust’ became more of a tax-planning tool for (relatively) short-term gains for both corporates as well as individuals.
This particular modus operandi was embraced by certain aspects of the legal profession and the newly nascent offshore / international finance centres and the industry blossomed throughout the 70’s, 80’s and 90’s attracting the interest of the various revenue services who could see their flow of funds being diverted.