London Daily

Focus on the big picture.
Tuesday, Sep 30, 2025

BVI FSC to invite applications for fintech "sandbox"

BVI FSC to invite applications for fintech "sandbox"

“Digitalisation is our ticket,” Jennifer Potter-Questelles, deputy managing director of corporate services at the Financial Services Commission, said last week during the FSC’s annual Meet the Regulator forum.

To help prove it, the commission plans to invite applications to the Virgin Islands’ new “sandbox” for financial technology, providing a testing environment that allows companies to experiment with new ideas within the VI’s regulatory framework without the full weight of the usual rules.

In the process, industry stakeholders hope the territory will attract new companies interested in the fast-growing “fintech” space.

“Integrity and sustainability of the industry are dependent on all the collective parts and more importantly on our connections to each other,” Ms. Potter-Questelles told the roughly 130 industry practitioners gathered at H. Lavity Stoutt Community College for the July 3 forum.

“Weak links, whether large or small, can have significant effect and impact. Sometimes size doesn’t matter, but strength always does. We need every connection to be strong.”

New sandbox

Kishelle Blaize‐Cameron, deputy director in the FSC’s Investment Business Division, explained how the regulatory regime would work.

Specific provisions of the regulatory legislation and regulatory code would be “disapplied” to participants in the sandbox, who can apply beginning in the fourth quarter of 2019, according to Ms. Blaize-Cameron.

These participants — which may include VI-registered and foreign companies — must include a detailed testing proposal and an exit strategy, meaning the company must cease operations after a certain date, she explained.

To qualify, companies must prove that they are “fit and proper,” demonstrating competence, integrity and financial soundness, according to Ms. Blaize-Cameron. In her presentation, she explained that they would be limited to a maximum number of clients, pay a fee, and be required to submit periodic progress reports.

Sandbox history

Since the rise of fintech, calls for a sandbox regime in the VI have been floated. The plan for the regime surfaced in Governor Gus Jaspert’s Speech from the Throne in March 2018, when he said the then-National Democratic Party-led government pledged to “use legislative measures to establish a regulatory sandbox regime to help develop new financial services product legislation.”

The same month, Ayanna Hull, a counsel at Harneys, said the territory was working on drafting related legislation, which she said would give innovators like cryptocurrency exchanges the opportunity to do trial runs in the territory to see if the VI’s regulations work for them. No legislation was introduced, however.

Kyla Forbes, a corporate communications associate at the FSC, in an email to the Beacon, wrote that “Regulations are to be issued under the Financial Services Commission Act, 2001 to enable and govern the Regulatory Sandbox operations.”

Other jurisdictions that have experimented with sandboxes in an effort to increase fintech innovation include the United Kingdom, Jersey, Hong Kong, Singapore, Australia, Canada and Malaysia, according to a recent white paper by Mirza Manraj at Harneys. Other Commonwealth countries have explored the concept as well.

Other presentations

Expanding on the forum’s digital focus, Kenneth Baker, deputy managing director of regulation at the FSC, explained how the commission is also digitising its anti-money-laundering processes and amending regulations to accommodate electronic verifications of identity.

Janay Waters and Chelcy Forbes, also from the Investment
Business Division, presented on system improvements to the application portal on mutual funds annual returns.

Newsletter

Related Articles

0:00
0:00
Close
Trump Announces Intention to Impose 100 Percent Tariff on Foreign-Made Films
Altman Says GPT-5 Already Outpaces Him, Warns AI Could Automate 40% of Work
Singapore and Hong Kong Vie to Dominate Asia’s Rising Gold Trade
Trump Organization Teams with Saudi Developer on $1 Billion Trump Plaza in Jeddah
Manhattan Sees Surge in Office-to-Housing Conversions, Highest Since 2008
Switzerland and U.S. Issue Joint Assurance Against Currency Manipulation
Electronic Arts to Be Taken Private in Historic $55 Billion Buyout
Thomas Jacob Sanford Named as Suspect in Deadly Michigan Church Shooting and Arson
Russian Research Vessel 'Yantar' Tracked Mapping Europe’s Subsea Cables, Raising Security Alarms
New York Man Arrested After On-Air Confession to 2017 Parents’ Murders
U.S. Defense Chief Orders Sudden Summit of Hundreds of Generals and Admirals
Global Cruise Industry Posts Dramatic Comeback with 34.6 Million Passengers in 2024
Trump Claims FBI Planted 274 Agents at Capitol Riot, Citing Unverified Reports
India: Internet Suspended in Bareilly Amid Communal Clashes Between Muslims and Hindus
Supreme Court Extends Freeze on Nearly $5 Billion in U.S. Foreign Aid at Trump’s Request
Archaeologists Recover Statues and Temples from 2,000-Year-Old Sunken City off Alexandria
China Deploys 2,000 Workers to Spain to Build Major EV Battery Factory, Raising European Dependence
Speed Takes Over: How Drive-Through Coffee Chains Are Rewriting U.S. Coffee Culture
U.S. Demands Brussels Scrutinize Digital Rules to Prevent Bias Against American Tech
Ringo Starr Champions Enduring Beatles Legacy While Debuting Las Vegas Art Show
Private Equity’s Fundraising Surge Triggers Concern of European Market Shake-Out
Colombian President Petro Vows to Mobilize Volunteers for Gaza and Joins List of Fighters
FBI Removes Agents Who Kneeled at 2020 Protest, Citing Breach of Professional Conduct
Trump Alleges ‘Triple Sabotage’ at United Nations After Escalator and Teleprompter Failures
Shock in France: 5 Years in Prison for Former President Nicolas Sarkozy
Tokyo’s Jimbōchō Named World’s Coolest Neighbourhood for 2025
European Officials Fear Trump May Shift Blame for Ukraine War onto EU
BNP Paribas Abandons Ban on 'Controversial Weapons' Financing Amid Europe’s Defence Push
Typhoon Ragasa Leaves Trail of Destruction Across East Asia Before Making Landfall in China
The Personality Rights Challenge in India’s AI Era
Big Banks Rebuild in Hong Kong as Deal Volume Surges
Italy Considers Freezing Retirement Age at 67 to Avert Scheduled Hike
Italian City to Impose Tax on Visiting Dogs Starting in 2026
Arnault Denounces Proposed Wealth Tax as Threat to French Economy
Study Finds No Safe Level of Alcohol for Dementia Risk
Denmark Investigates Drone Incursion, Does Not Rule Out Russian Involvement
Lilly CEO Warns UK Is ‘Worst Country in Europe’ for Drug Prices, Pulls Back Investment
Nigel Farage Emerges as Central Force in British Politics with Reform UK Surge
Disney Reinstates ‘Jimmy Kimmel Live!’ after Six-Day Suspension over Charlie Kirk Comments
U.S. Prosecutors Move to Break Up Google’s Advertising Monopoly
Nvidia Pledges Up to $100 Billion Investment in OpenAI to Power Massive AI Data Center Build-Out
U.S. Signals ‘Large and Forceful’ Support for Argentina Amid Market Turmoil
Nvidia and Abu Dhabi’s TII Launch First AI-&-Robotics Lab in the Middle East
Vietnam Faces Up to $25 Billion Export Loss as U.S. Tariffs Bite
Europe Signals Stronger Support for Taiwan at Major Taipei Defence Show
Indonesia Court Upholds Military Law Amid Concerns Over Expanded Civilian Role
Larry Ellison, Michael Dell and Rupert Murdoch Join Trump-Backed Bid to Take Over TikTok
Trump and Musk Reunite Publicly for First Time Since Fallout at Kirk Memorial
Vietnam Closes 86 Million Untouched Bank Accounts Over Biometric ID Rules
Explosive Email Shows Sarah Ferguson Begged Forgiveness from Jeffrey Epstein After Taking His Money
×