New Law on the Re-Domiciliation of Foreign Companies in Russia
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Key takeaways:
- The Federal Law on International Companies that allows foreign companies to be re-domiciled (re-registered) in Russia took effect on August 3, 2018, making Russia one of the first CIS countries to adopt such law. Under the law, a foreign company can be registered in the Russian State Register of Legal Entities as a limited liability company or a joint-stock company with the status of an international company.
- The ability of a foreign company to re-domicile will in practice depend not only on the existence of the technical procedure for re-registration in Russia, but also on whether the law of the country of the foreign company’s initial registration allows such re-domiciliation.
- The location of an international company, which is determined by the location of its sole executive body, must be within the special administrative zones on Russky Island (Primorsky Region) or Oktyabrsky Island (Kaliningrad Region).
- Particular attention should be paid to the legal impact of re-domiciliation on the contractual obligations of the company that are governed by foreign law.
- For the purposes of currency control legislation, an international company is considered a non-resident.