On April 1, 2022, the Dutch Ministry of Finance issued a press release announcing that as a result of the illegal aggression in Ukraine, services rendered by trust offices aimed at Russian money flows will be prohibited. There will, for example, be a ban on providing trust services to persons and companies that are established in, or that have an ultimate beneficial owner (UBO) that is a resident of, Russia or Belarus. This makes it more difficult for these parties to operate via the Netherlands. They can no longer be facilitated by trust offices in the Netherlands and must arrange the establishment, administration and management of the legal entity themselves.

According to the press release the Dutch Ministry of Finance is of the opinion that these measures should preferably be arranged at a European level. However, because it is uncertain whether this will be possible in the short term, national emergency legislation is being prepared in the Netherlands. On the proposal of the Dutch Minister of Finance, the Dutch Council of Ministers has approved a law proposal, which will be submitted to the Raad van State for urgent advice. Subsequently the proposal is then to be submitted to the Dutch House of Representatives and the Duch Senate.

According to the press release the announced law proposal also prohibits the offering of conduit companies and the provision of trust services if third countries, which are considered to be high-risk countries in the area of money laundering or if non-cooperative jurisdictions in the field of taxation are involved. According to the Ministry conduit companies are legal entities that belong to the trust office's group and that are used to 'flow through' client funds, such as dividends or royalties, for tax purposes. Under the announced law proposal it is therefore completely prohibit for trust offices to use of conduit companies for professional or commercial purposes.

Unfortunately the Dutch Ministry of Finance has not yet released the (draft) text of the law proposal.

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