Cayman Islands Web3 Foundations Jump 70% As Carf Reporting Rules...

Cayman foundation registrations increase by 70% year-on-year as DAOs seek legal wrappers, with CARF rules set to arrive in 2026.

New figures reveal a 70% year-on-year increase in Cayman Islands foundation company registrations, with more than 1,300 on the books at the end of 2024, and over 400 new registrations already in 2025.

These structures are increasingly being used as legal wrappers for decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs) and as ecosystem stewards for major Web3 projects.

According to a news release from Cayman Finance, many of the world’s largest Web3 projects are now registered in the Cayman Islands, including at least 17 foundation companies with treasuries over $100 million.

The Cayman foundation company has emerged as a preferred tool for DAOs that need to sign contracts, hire contributors, hold IP and interact with regulators, all while shielding tokenholders from personal liability for the DAO's obligations.

The legal wake‑up call for many communities came in 2024 with Samuels v. Lido DAO, in which a US federal judge found that an unwrapped DAO could be treated as a general partnership under California law, exposing participants to personal liability.

The Cayman foundation company is designed to plug that gap, offering a separate legal personality and the ability to own assets and sign agreements, while giving tokenholders assurance that they are not partners by default.

Add tax neutrality, a legal framework familiar to institutional allocators and an ecosystem of companies that specialize in Web3 treasuries, and it becomes clear why more projects have quietly redomiciled their foundations to Grand Cayman.​

Elsewhere, policymakers have made big promises but delivered patchwork. US President Donald Trump has repeatedly pledged to turn the United States into the “crypto capital of the planet,” but at the entity level, only a handful of states explicitly recognize DAOs as legal persons.

Switzerland remains the archetypal onshore Web3 foundation center, with the Crypto Valley region now hosting over 1,700 active blockchain firms, up more than 130% since 2020, with foundations and associations representing a growing share of new structures.

Source: CoinTelegraph