Article on the Private Family Trust Company

John P.C. Duncan recently published an Article entitled, The Private Family Trust Company: The Most Customized Financial Institution Ever Devised, Tr. & Est. 36 (March 2017). Provided below is an abstract of the Article:

No financial institution charter ever devised provides a greater level of involvement by its customers in its management or a greater range of services it’s empowered to deliver than the private family trust company (PFTC) as it stands today. That charter, and the trust laws it’s designed to take advantage of, are the conscious result of 24 years of work by a large number of dedicated people to integrate the hopes and aspirations of wealthy families for their futures with the legal environments governing their wealth, especially their wealth held in trusts. 

The family visions are wide ranging and multidimensional, covering multiple branches and generations. They address keeping the family together for generations if possible and building strong and productive family members, living lives they find happy and meaningful in light of the family’s values. But, the visions and strategies for realizing them are as various as the families they serve and require legal environments that are supportive, flexible and adaptable.