Transcript of the above video:

As the title of this video suggests, we are discussing the issue of nominees, this is nominee shareholders in Thailand. As many may know, under the Foreign Business Act, it is a requirement oftentimes for foreigners looking to do business in Thailand to pair off with a Thai national oftentimes to gain some kind of partnership to set up a 49/51 foreign to Thai ratio company in order to do business in compliance with the Foreign Business Act. It may also be possible to obtain benefits under the US-Thai Treaty of Amity for Americans that allows American citizens to own their companies out right. There also may be things like BOI concessions and concessions under the EEC, the Eastern Economic Corridor - BOI stands for Board of Investment - there may be ways around that 49/51 rule that are perfectly legal. But one of the ways that isn't and is overtly illegal in Thailand is the usage of nominee shareholders.

I thought of making this video after reading a recent article in the Bangkok Post, bangkokpost.com, the article is titled: Nominee search turns up 400 firms. Quoting directly: More than 400 companies in popular tourism cities tend to operate their businesses using nominees, according to the Business Development Department. The agency found that 419 firms may be acting as business nominees; 313 of them were ordered to submit more documents for verification. The Department is also working with the Tourism Department and the Department of Special Investigation (DSI) to check 59 firms suspected to be operating as nominees in Phuket. The inspection followed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed by the Tourism Department to resolve proxy tourism businesses through the cooperation of six agencies - the Tourism Department, the Office of the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Tourism and Sports, the Department of Business Development, the DSI, the Tourist Police Bureau and the Immigration Bureau. "

Yeah so in follow-up to recent videos we did on the so-called 'beach bully' Visa case, the matter of this foreign national who is basically being prosecuted in a land encroachment matter, not really pertinent to this video per se. I did make some videos talking about I thought there was a high likelihood we would start seeing a lot of scrutiny on foreign businesses possibly arising out of that. Then I did another video, we saw another news story about a crackdown I believe it was on Koh Phangan of a daycare, an American owned daycare that was completely out of compliance apparently with the Foreign Business Act and the result of that, well when we were reading the article, the officers who were undertaking the crackdown basically said 'we have new orders, we are cracking down on foreign businesses who are not operating in compliance with Thai Law.' This appears to be an extension of that. It looks like again Thai Authorities are quite serious about compliance with Thai Law both from the standpoint of things like restricted occupations, and the Foreign Business Act. Meanwhile, now it looks like we are seeing even strict scrutiny being applied to the underlying shareholders in some of these operations. So again this is one more reason why you need to maintain compliance with relevant laws here in the Kingdom if you are looking to run a business. That being said, those who feel a bit overwhelmed about trying to set up a business and all the legalities associated therewith, are well-advised to contact a legal professional, gain some insight and guidance into how best to proceed.