Introduction

This chapter and the next two describe work carried out in respect of the ‘Offshore’ environment by some supranational organisations: the Financial Stability Forum (FSF), the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

This particular chapter focuses on the work of the Financial Stability Forum (FSF), and on the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank, beginning with the FSF. The FSF itself has been described in Chapter 9, so the outline that follows merely serves to place the work of the FSF in respect of ‘Offshore’ in context.

The work of the Financial Stability Forum

With reference to its work on ‘Offshore’ in particular, ‘the objective of the FSF's OFC initiative is to strengthen the supervisory, regulatory information sharing and international cooperation practices of OFCs on a lasting basis’. At its inaugural meeting on 14 April 1999, the FSF created a Working Group on ‘Offshore Finance Centres’. The Working Group was asked to:

• consider the uses of OFCs and the possible role they have had or could play in posing threats to the stability of the financial system;

• evaluate the adherence of OFCs with internationally accepted standards and good practices; and

• […]