Caribbean Watch List for 2026
Caribbean law firms face a more complex mix of economic, regulatory, and geopolitical forces in 2026 than at any time in the past decade.
Five developments deserve particular attention and, for many firms in the region, should be part of their business strategy at least for the next three years.
1. Economic growth will be slower and uneven across the region, but will create new opportunities for firms that are prepared for them.
The macroeconomic outlook for 2026 is one of modest, slowing growth for Latin America and the Caribbean overall, but with the Caribbean outperforming the regional average. The World Bank projects Caribbean growth at about 5.8% in 2026, driven somewhat disproportionately by Guyana’s rapidly expanding offshore oil production. Excluding Guyana, Caribbean growth is expected to be closer to 3.1%. This reflects a major theme running through all five of the main points in this article: a significant variation in economic performance and its implications among the national economies of the region.
At the same time, regional institutions warn that growth across Latin America and the Caribbean is likely to decelerate to around the mid‑2% range by 2026 as the post‑pandemic rebound fades and global trade tensions persist. Governments are being pressed to stabilize public debt, improve tax collection, and strengthen the rule of law to attract investment, all of which will translate into further waves of legislative and regulatory change with direct implications for legal work.
For law firms in the Caribbean, Guyana’s rapid rise is a case study of both an opportunity and a stress test. Guyana’s offshore oil sector has passed 800,000 barrels per day and is targeting roughly 1.7 million barrels per day by 2030, supported by a consortium led by ExxonMobil alongside Chevron and CNOOC, and a growing ecosystem of foreign service providers. The government is planning a second offshore block auction in 2026, and is actively courting investors from India and beyond, signaling that the deal and disputes pipeline in hydrocarbons, infrastructure, and ancillary sectors will continue to deepen.
Law firms across the wider Caribbean should therefore be paying close attention to these implications for their practices and the legal-service needs of their clients:
Project finance, EPC contracts, joint ventures, local content rules, and complex risk allocation will dominate new deals around Guyana’s oil, gas, and associated infrastructure.
Firms in Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, Suriname, and offshore centers such as the Cayman Islands and the BVI can position themselves as finance, structuring, and disputes hubs for regional energy projects.
Heightened environmental and liability regimes, such as Guyana’s new Oil Pollution Prevention, Preparedness, Response, and Responsibility Act, enacted in 2025, creates a comprehensive national framework for spill prevention and response and holds operators liable for full environmental restoration and damages. This sets a standard likely to influence environmental and risk‑management frameworks across the region, expanding demand for specialized regulatory, insurance, and crisis‑management counsel.
Rapid growth, high expectations, and significant foreign investment will increase the risk of contractual disputes, allegations of corruption, and political backlash, especially where benefits are seen as uneven.
Law firms with credible public‑law, arbitration, and investigations practices will find opportunities to advise both states and investors on treaty‑based protections, stabilization clauses, and dispute resolution mechanisms.
2. Sanctions, tax transparency, and more vigorous financial regulation will intensify pressures on offshore centers.
Caribbean financial centers face an accelerating wave of regulatory change in 2026, particularly around tax transparency, sanctions, and digital assets. Authorities in jurisdictions such as the Cayman Islands and the BVI are implementing updated global standards on information exchange and beneficial ownership, while major onshore economies push to tighten enforcement against tax evasion, money laundering, and sanctions violations.
One emblematic development is the implementation of “CRS Regime 2.0” and related frameworks. From 1 January 2026, the Cayman Islands is rolling out extensive amendments to its Common Reporting Standard regulations, tightening data‑quality requirements, aligning due diligence with evolving anti‑money‑laundering standards, and explicitly bringing crypto‑assets, electronic money, and central bank digital currencies into scope. In early 2026, regulators in the Cayman Islands and BVI are also acting on the OECD’s updated CRS 2.0 and the new Crypto‑Asset Reporting Framework, while introducing new obligations around beneficial ownership and sanctions reporting.
Law firms with clients with interests in these jurisdictions will face challenges such as:
More complex compliance and advisory mandates: Financial institutions and corporate service providers are facing stricter obligations on client due diligence, data accuracy, local “principal point of contact” requirements, and more granular reporting, with non‑compliance attracting faster and more predictable penalties. Firms that can integrate tax, regulatory, data‑protection, and technology perspectives will be better positioned to guide clients through system redesign, policy drafting, and remediation projects.
Sanctions and geopolitical risk in structuring work: UK sanctions rules and reporting obligations are being extended to certain Caribbean territories, with updates that cover new categories such as irregular migration and people trafficking, as well as changes to sanctions designation lists. This increases the legal complexity of cross‑border transactions involving sanctioned jurisdictions or politically exposed persons, and makes proactive sanctions‑risk assessment an indispensable part of corporate and finance instructions.
Challenges to the future of privacy‑driven offshore banking: Commentators in the financial‑technology and banking sectors argue that 2026 could be a decisive year for privacy‑driven offshore finance as regulators move to close loopholes and bring digital assets fully into transparency regimes. Jurisdictions such as Belize are being advised that they are unlikely to continue to thrive unless they pivot from secrecy‑based models to highly compliant, transparent frameworks, creating opportunities for legal advisors who can help redesign products and business models consistent with new expectations.
Law firms that treat regulatory‑change monitoring as a core capability, and invest in cross‑border collaboration, will be better prepared to manage the flood of client queries and enforcement‑driven work that these shifts will generate.
3. Climate finance, blue economy legislation, and ESG scrutiny will become more important than ever before.
Climate policy and the “blue economy” are moving from the margins to the center of Caribbean economic strategy in 2026, with important legal and transactional consequences. The region is highly exposed to climate risks but has limited fiscal space, which pushes governments to seek innovative financing mechanisms, particularly around sustainable oceans, coastal resilience, and renewable energy.
Recent years have already seen pioneering “blue bond” and debt‑for‑nature transactions, notably in Belize and Barbados. Belize’s 2021 blue bond agreement restructured more than US$500 million of external debt, while establishing long‑term funding for marine conservation and climate resilience; this has catalyzed further initiatives, including the development of a comprehensive Blue Economy Bill to formalize governance and clarify institutional roles. International institutions such as the IFC have responded by publishing detailed guidelines for blue finance instruments, setting out eligibility criteria and metrics for loans, bonds, and sustainability‑linked structures focused on marine and freshwater resources.
For Caribbean law firms, this evolving landscape opens several fronts:
Structuring complex climate‑finance transactions: Blue bonds, sustainability‑linked loans, and debt‑for‑nature swaps demand careful drafting around environmental covenants, performance indicators, verification mechanisms, and default consequences. Firms that can bridge sovereign‑debt expertise, capital‑markets skills, and environmental law will be in high demand as more governments and state‑owned entities seek access to these instruments.
Advising on emerging blue‑economy legislation: Belize’s forthcoming Blue Economy Bill aims to formalize ocean‑governance arrangements and align ministries, communities, and the private sector behind a clear legislative framework for sustainable ocean use. Similar frameworks are likely to emerge or expand across the region, generating advisory work on licensing regimes, marine‑protected areas, fisheries and tourism regulations, and the rights and obligations of private investors in coastal and offshore projects.
Managing ESG, greenwashing, and disclosure risk: The IMF warns that both green equity funds and sustainable‑debt instruments in Latin America and the Caribbean are vulnerable to “greenwashing” if standards are not rigorous and transparent. Financial institutions and corporates will increasingly need legal guidance on ESG disclosure, taxonomy alignment, and the defense of their sustainability claims, particularly as global investors and regulators intensify scrutiny.
As climate‑driven shocks and opportunities multiply, Caribbean law firms that develop credible environmental, climate‑finance, and ESG practices will gain a competitive edge, particularly when they can combine local insight with international market standards.
4. Digital transformation, AI adoption, and evolving data‑governance expectations will drive an ever-increasing pace of change.
The Caribbean legal market is undergoing a rapid digital transformation, with artificial intelligence now firmly embedded in everyday practice. According to the Caribbean Legal Market 2026 report, nearly eight in ten Caribbean attorneys report using AI tools, and three‑quarters say they are more confident when the tools are grounded in trusted legal sources, underscoring the centrality of trust and quality in technology adoption. At the same time, firms cite rising operating costs, the pace of technological change, and cybersecurity risks as among their most pressing challenges.
Beyond law‑firm operations, clients in the Caribbean are also being swept up in global shifts in data‑protection, privacy, and AI governance. Many Caribbean data‑protection statutes draw from core GDPR principles, and as the EU’s AI Act and new privacy regimes in major markets (including in the United States and Asia‑Pacific) come into force, regional regulators and policymakers are likely to revisit their own frameworks.
Law firms in region — even the smallest ones — should focus on three interlinked developments:
Client demand for data‑protection, cybersecurity, and AI‑governance advice: New global data‑protection and privacy laws taking effect in 2026 introduce stricter requirements around lawful processing, transparency, data minimization, and security safeguards, and they expand enforcement tools, including revenue‑linked fines in some cases. Caribbean organizations that serve global customers or process foreign data will need guidance on cross‑border data transfers, vendor management, AI‑driven profiling, and incident response, creating sustained work for firms with robust technology and privacy practices.
AI‑enabled practice and legal‑risk management inside firms: With AI becoming a baseline expectation for speed and efficiency, law firms must design internal policies that address confidentiality, bias, accountability, and client‑consent issues tied to AI use. Firms that position themselves as responsible adopters, emphasizing transparent, well‑governed AI usage anchored in authoritative content, will be better placed to maintain client confidence and differentiate on quality rather than mere speed.
Regulatory convergence and divergence pressures: The Caribbean sits between two competing governance models for AI and data—from the EU’s more prescriptive risk‑based AI framework to a more sectoral and decentralized approach in the United States—creating potential conflicts and forum‑shopping opportunities. Legal advisors must help clients map their obligations across these regimes and anticipate how domestic regulators may incorporate or adapt elements from global standards, especially in financial services, health, and public‑sector digitization.
Digital transformation is not just a technology story; it is a governance and risk story that will shape both law‑firm business models and client demand across the Caribbean in 2026.
5. Security, narco-violence, great‑power competition, and a weakening of the international rule of law will have heightened risks and consequences.
Security and geopolitics are increasingly central to Caribbean risk assessments, with narcoviolence, migration, and great‑power rivalry all influencing legal and commercial decisions. Analysts expect U.S. military presence and security cooperation in parts of the Caribbean to remain elevated through 2026 and possibly increase, as Washington takes a more aggressive stance toward what it considers to be national-security threats from gang violence, drug trafficking corridors, and instability in neighboring states. These policy choices are already beginning to affect, and to some extent complicate, migration flows, tourism patterns, and international investment decisions. The same analysis highlights the expanding commercial presence of China and, to a smaller extent, India throughout the region.
This evolving security environment carries several implications for law firms:
Heightened political‑risk and investment‑protection work: The interaction of security operations, sanctions policies, and domestic politics will affect foreign‑investment decisions in tourism, energy, infrastructure, and digital connectivity across the Caribbean. Investors will increasingly look for legal advice on political‑risk mitigation, including bilateral investment treaties, contract design, force‑majeure and material‑adverse‑change clauses, and recourse to international arbitration.
Cross‑border crime, migration, and human‑rights mandates: Some governments in the region are trying to deal with higher levels of violence fueled by narco‑funding, local gangs, and the flow of firearms, while also facing pressure over irregular migration and human‑trafficking routes. This creates demand for specialized counsel in criminal‑justice reform, extradition, migration and asylum law, human‑rights litigation, and compliance with new sanctions and reporting obligations tied to trafficking and organized crime.
Strategic alignment choices and contractual exposure: The Caribbean is a focal point for broader great‑power competition, with the United States seeking to reinforce its security and economic ties while China and other emerging powers expand their commercial footprint in infrastructure, energy, and digital sectors. Legal advisors must help governments and private clients understand how alignment decisions and financing sources can affect access to markets, exposure to sanctions and export‑control regimes, and the enforceability of contracts under different governing‑law and dispute‑resolution clauses.
Security and geopolitics are no longer background conditions; they are increasingly central variables in transactional structuring, risk allocation, and dispute strategies in the Caribbean context.
Your Strategic Partner for 2026 and Beyond
These five developments will shape the opportunity and risk profile of Caribbean legal markets not only in 2026 but probably until the end of the decade. Each trend cuts across traditional practice‑area boundaries, demanding not only legal expertise but also strategic foresight, organizational change, and disciplined execution within law firms.
Walker Clark LLC works exclusively with law firms and legal organizations worldwide to help them understand such structural shifts, evaluate their own capabilities, and build pragmatic strategies for sustainable performance. For Caribbean firms, Walker Clark can assist with: identifying and prioritizing market opportunities; assessing practice‑group readiness for new regulatory and transactional demands; designing governance and risk‑management frameworks; leading change, not just responding to it; and developing implementation‑ready business plans that align people, processes, and technology with the realities of 2026 and beyond.
Use the secure e-mail link at the bottom of this page to schedule a complimentary, strictly confidential conversation with a senior Walker Clark member to discuss how we can help your firm achieve its full potential in these rapidly changing times.