Territorial tax is a rule with conditions.

Belize, Costa Rica and Panama. El Salvador and Nicaragua charge 30% and Guatemala charges 25% on net profit or 7% on gross - their appeal is a regime, not a system.

It means the country of registration does not tax foreign-source income. It does not mean nobody taxes it - where you are resident and where the company is managed usually decide that. Source is judged on facts: where the work is done, where the customer is, where the contract is performed. The local tax authority decides in the first instance, and you want the evidence assembled before it asks.

Belize in one to two business days and Panama in three to five, both through an agent. Costa Rica, El Salvador and Guatemala run one to two weeks and Nicaragua one to three. All six can be done remotely - the agent files in Belize and Panama, and the other four are signed under a power of attorney.

It is a question at the bank, which is not the same thing. What changed is real: resident agents must know their clients and hold the ownership file, that information reaches a register the authorities can query, accounting records have to be kept and delivered, and companies that ignore any of it are suspended and struck off. The register is closed - regulators see it, the public does not. Expect a compliance officer to ask why Panama rather than somewhere nearer your customers, where the income arises, who the ultimate owner is and where the founding money came from. Those are answerable. Not being able to answer them is what causes a refusal, not the word on the certificate.

Panama is the hemisphere's banking hub and a company that trades there banks there normally. Costa Rica is workable for a company with real local activity. A Belize BC is the hardest of the six to bank anywhere, and it should be opened before incorporation, not after. Nicaragua needs sanctions screening before a bank will start, and El Salvador should expect questions about crypto whether or not you touch it.

Belize - the lowest all-in annual cost of the six, with no minimum capital. The saving is worth nothing if the structure then fails at the bank, which is the usual way a Belize file goes wrong.

Nicaragua for cost - the region's lowest labour costs and free zones shipping duty-free to the US under CAFTA - if the sanctions and governance risk is one you can carry. Guatemala for scale, with the largest workforce and economy in the region; budget its payroll in full, because two extra statutory salaries a year mean fourteen payments, not twelve. El Salvador if the activity is technology, where the exemption runs at 0% for fifteen years. Panama if what you need is dollar settlement and logistics rather than a factory.

It differs across the six and it is one of the real cost drivers. Belize and Panama require a licensed registered or resident agent, and ownership can be entirely foreign. Costa Rica allows 100% foreign ownership but, like El Salvador, Guatemala and Nicaragua, expects a legal representative the registry and the tax authority can reach in the country. That role carries liability, so it is a decision, not a formality.

Sometimes. The sanctions are targeted rather than country-wide, so screening is required and we do it before filing. If you, your counterparties or your buyers touch a listed person, the answer is no. Some banks and some US customers decline the country outright whatever the screening shows, and you should test that with them before you spend anything.

Then that is what the opinion says. If your customers, your staff and your management are all in one country, a company there paying its ordinary rate is usually the right structure, and no amount of territoriality changes it.