Redomiciliation of companies to "Russian offshores"

Abstract

Over the past 25 years, Russian corporate law has developed very rapidly, absorbing previously unknown concepts. One of these concepts was the possibility of redomiciliation of companies. For this purpose, a special statute was adopted in 2018, according to which two special administrative regions (SAR) appeared in the two most extreme points of Russia - in Kaliningrad and Vladivostok. The Russian authorities declared that the SAR were created to offer foreign companies more favorable tax conditions and reduce the outflow of capital outside Russia. Despite all the efforts, until the end of 2022, only 27 companies had redomiciled to the SAR. An explosive growth in redomiciliation in the SAR occurred at the beginning of 2022, after the start of the Russian «special military operation in Ukraine» (known in the EU and the USA as «Russian invasion of Ukraine»). Since the beginning of 2022, more than 300 companies have already been registered in the SAR, and, according to all forecasts, their number will continue to grow.