Bermuda: Financial Services

This comprehensive guide examines how five major offshore jurisdictions—Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Guernsey, and Jersey—approach close-out netting and set-off provisions in insolvency scenarios. The analysis explores the enforceability of ISDA Master Agreements and the critical distinctions between statutory frameworks and contractual arrangements across these financial centers.

Legal teams care about structure, disclosure and enforceability; capital teams care about classification, diversification and solvency treatment; actuarial teams care about cash-flow behaviour...

Bermuda has emerged as a regulatory pioneer by licensing crypto-based prediction markets under its digital asset framework, treating event contracts as derivatives rather than gambling products. As prediction markets blur the lines between traditional derivatives trading and betting, understanding how these platforms fit within existing legal frameworks becomes critical for operators and institutions.

As part of ensuring compliance with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) standards on beneficial ownership and transparency, Bermuda has streamlined its beneficial ownership regime.

Annual catastrophe bond issuance hit record heights for the third consecutive year in 2025, and as Brad Adderley, Managing Partner at law firm Appleby’s Bermuda office highlights, given the significant activity and momentum observed in the market, it would not be unexpected for the market to achieve $20 billion once more in 2026.

Our Bermuda update highlights key enhancements that the Bermuda Monetary Authority has made to regulations to extend the scope of the Digital Asset Regimes and ensure it remains relevant...

The Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA) has recently published instructions for a significant data collection exercise: the 2025 Global Financial Crisis (GFC) Stress Test.

With payments becoming increasingly digital and complex, the BMA is moving to update Bermuda's regulatory framework. The proposed PSA is intended to provide structure for licensing and supervising PSPs.

In November 2024, the Bermuda Monetary Authority (the "BMA") released a consultation on a proposed new framework for the licensing and supervision of providers of non-governmental digital identities...