Prince Harry and Meghan Markle have been setting up firms in an American tax haven, according to reports.
A lawyer and business manager for the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have incorporated 11 companies and a trust for the couple since April 2020, state filings show.
Even though the couple live and do business in California, they set up the firms in the state of Delaware, which does not tax business transactions and does not impose inheritance tax.
Benefits of setting up a company in Delaware also include low personal income tax rates and the fact shareholders who do not live in Delaware do not need to pay tax on shares in the state.
Some 65 per cent of Fortune 500 companies are incorporated in Delaware.
Harry and Meghan’s firms include one called Orinoco Publishing LLC, thought to have been launched to hold the rights for Harry’s bombshell multi-million-dollar memoir, due to be published this year. The duke has vowed to give a “wholly truthful” account of his life.
Another publishing firm, Peca Publishing LLC, was used by Meghan to hold the rights for her children’s book The Bench, according to MailOnline.
The companies are all based in the Beverly Hills offices of attorney Richard Genow, who has worked with the duchess for years.
Orinoco is the name of a South American river, which flows through Venezuela and Colombia. The word peca means freckle in Spanish, and appears to be a reference to a book Meghan wrote at school entitled A Face Without Freckles... Is a Night Without Stars.
Some of the Sussexes’ Delaware firms were set up to hold the trademarks for their charity Archewell and its associated companies.
In a complicated structure, Harry and Meghan set up Cobblestone Lane LLC as the holder of the Archewell logo, but lodged another trademark filing for a second logo, with just the letters AW on top of each other, under a different Delaware firm, IPHW LLC, MailOnline said.
Cobblestone Lane LLC was incorporated in Delaware in February 2020 and five days later was used as the applicant to file for the Archewell trademark.
Though both Archewell and Cobblestone are based in California, there were no filings for the LLC registered with the California Secretary of State.
Archewell Audio LLC and Archewell Productions LLC have already drawn international attention over the Sussexes’ high-profile entertainment deals with Netflix and Spotify.
