The Central Bank of Seychelles (CBS) says it is engaging with Barclays Bank Seychelles to ensure that clients have sufficient time to shift their deposits in their offshore bank accounts, following a recent decision by Barclays to discontinue its banking services for non-residents in foreign currencies.

While Barclays refused to comment on the decision to SNA, the CBS issued a press statement jointly with the Seychelles Ministry of Finance, Trade and the Blue Economy, Financial Services Authority (FSA) and Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) on Friday last week.

"Following a remediation exercise, Barclays determined that the level of risk arising from its offshore banking activities is not in line with its risk appetite, which refers to the level of risk that the bank is prepared to take," read the statement. "However, as a result of global tightening in the regulatory environment and large fines imposed on international banks, financial institutions are increasingly restricting business relationships with high risk clients or categories of clients to avoid the risk of sanction."

The financial authorities acknowledged the difficulties faced by the clients given Barclays' decision. According to information provided to SNA by CBS, all of Barclays' offshore clients were informed about the decision and the date of the service closure is October 31, 2015.

"International standards for risk management in financial services identify offshore banking as a higher category of risk in view that most of the customers do not have a presence in the jurisdiction in which the bank operates which makes it more difficult to apply Know Your Customer procedures and consistent monitoring," said the joint statement.