ONE of life's more elegant little paradoxes is that offshore banking thrives on crisis.
The typical and traditional knee-jerk reaction to sudden events such as the outbreak of war, for example, is to buy into gold.
A more sophisticated and longer-term solution is to park one's resources in one of the world's centres famed for its ability to sail smoothly through the roughest storms.
Guernsey is one such safe haven. In an important sense, the tiny island is like a swan . . . serenely graceful on the surface, paddling furiously below.
Superficially, Guernsey remains a tranquil, private place but, underneath, it has been forced into increasingly aggressive marketing to retain its position in the hierarchy of offshore banking centres.
Competition from more recently established newcomers, such as Dublin and Luxembourg, has threatened to erode Guernsey's ranking.