Environmental, Social & Governance
Our clients are increasingly interested in exploring socially conscious, environmentally sustainable, and ethical investments using offshore companies.
International financial centres, such as the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Luxembourg, and Cyprus, are attractive jurisdictions as they have robust legal systems. They provide a neutral platform without an additional tax layer and are critical to global investment.
Our Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) practice group brings together experienced investment funds, corporate, and banking professionals who understand the unique demands and culture of this fast-developing sector.
Our client list includes ESG focussed investment funds and managers, corporates, joint ventures, private equity firms, private investors, development banks and financiers, NGOs and governments.
Highlights of our experience include:
- Advising a number of investment funds and managers who are pursuing ESG as part of their investment strategy, which has become an important driver for the investment funds industry.
- Advising regulated and non-regulated entities on anti-money laundering and terrorist financing compliance, financial services regulation, sanctions, tax, tax information exchange and data protection. We work regularly and positively in this area with the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office, HM Treasury, European External Action Service and United Nations.
- Advising Virgin on its majority acquisition of BMR Energy, a renewable energy group active throughout the Caribbean and Latin America, from NASDAQ-listed private equity firm American Capital. The acquisition is part of a drive towards clean energy by the Virgin Group, which is owned by Sir Richard Branson. Recent BMR Energy projects include a wind farm in Jamaica made up of eleven 3.3 MW wind turbines, which is set to significantly reduce Jamaica's reliance on fossil fuels.
- Acting on behalf of Kingo Energy, which used a BVI Company as a special purpose vehicle to raise capital on several occasions from multi-national investors. The BVI Company provided a neutral investment platform for the multinational investors. Kingo Energy provides decentralised solar energy services to families and businesses in off-grid villages across the world, and to date has supplied its energy solutions to the Caribbean, Central America, South America and South Africa.
- Acting for the Recovery and Development Agency in the BVI, after being selected via a formal public tender process. Harneys was awarded a contract for the provision of legal services, which encompasses real estate and infrastructure projects, as well as corporate and commercial and dispute resolution advice.
- Acting as Cypriot counsel to Senvion GMBH in connection with a US$66 million financing provided to Luxembourg Mainstream Chile Holdings S. À R. L. for the purpose of implementing the construction and operation of two wind energy projects in Chile with an aggregate capacity of up to 299 MW, consisting of A.M. Eólica Sarco SpA and A.M. Eólica Llanquihue SpA, and for the refinancing of certain indebtedness owed by Aela Eólica Negrete SpA.
