Conyers Dill & Pearman
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Conyers Dill & Pearman is an offshore law firm. Founded in Bermuda in 1928 (although it can trace its roots back to 1903), the firm has subsequently opened legal practices in a number of other offshore financial centres, including the British Virgin Islands and the Cayman Islands. It also has offices in a number of onshore commercial centres, including London, Hong Kong, Singapore and Dubai.
The firm's founding father, Reginald Conyers, played an important role in the development of the nascent financial services industry in Bermuda in the 1920s and 30s. Following on from the Bermuda Railway Company Act 1924, Conyers was faced with the legal problem of conveying huge numbers of land parcels by the company. This lead to two things. Firstly, he took on two partners in his practice, James Pearman and Bayard Dill (and thus the firm was officially born). Secondly, in 1935 the firm was instrumental in the enactment of the first "exempt company" legislation in Bermuda, which leads some to claim that Bermuda was the world's first offshore financial centre.[1] Later, in 1957 another partner of the firm, David Graham, laid the basis for the development of Bermuda as a domicile for ship registrations in a letter to The Times.[2]
Perhaps uniquely amongst multi-jurisdictional offshore firms, Conyers' expansion has been entirely by way of organic growth, rather than by acquisition of smaller firms in jurisdictions it wishes to operate in. The firm can also legitimately claim to be the first offshore firm to operate in multiple jurisdictions; the original Bermudian firm opening a British Virgin Islands office in 1997.
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[edit] Footnotes
- ^ In practice the Bermudian claim does not stand up to scrutiny; Liechtenstein enacted trust laws to attract tax exempt foreign capital in 1926.
- ^ The firm's role in the development of offshore finance is noted in Tolley's International Initiatives Affecting Financial Havens (2001), ISBN 0-406-94264-1
