Ora Partners

Ora Partners is a family-owned Cook Islands trustee group based in Avarua, Rarotonga. Its licensed arm, Ora Fiduciary (Cook Islands) Limited, is one of the ten trustee companies the Cook Islands Financial Supervisory Commission has licensed. It administers trusts, companies, and foundations under the Trustee Companies Act 2014.

Founder Puai Wichman has worked in asset protection since 1993 and co-founded the company in 2007. The firm publishes no fee schedule. Its website leads with three things beyond standard trust administration: digital asset custody through an institutional custodian, white-label trustee arrangements for advisors, and Cook Islands ownership.

Ownership and Leadership

Ora Partners describes itself as a family business, and both founders are Cook Islanders. Puai Wichman, the founder and executive director, is admitted as a solicitor in the Cook Islands and has nearly 30 years in the jurisdiction’s offshore sector. Tai Ngari, the co-founder, has more than 25 years in Cook Islands trustee company work.

The board reaches beyond the family. Henry Lynch, the chair, is a New Zealand company director and a chartered member of the Institute of Directors. Phil Creagh, a director, chairs the partners of Hamilton Locke, a New Zealand law firm. Tuaine Marsters, also a director, is a Cook Islands barrister and solicitor with more than 20 years in the trustee sector.

Day-to-day operations sit with David Street, the chief operations officer, who joined in 2024 after running BSP Financial Group’s Cook Islands business. Julian Zeman, who leads structuring work for international families and their advisors, is originally from California and knows what U.S. high-net-worth families expect.

A trustee run from Rarotonga by its founding family gives a creditor no U.S. office to pressure. A U.S. court can compel the settlor, but not a Cook Islands trustee, to return trust assets. The creditor’s only route is a fresh Cook Islands action decided under local law.

Regulatory Status

The Cook Islands Financial Supervisory Commission licenses Ora Fiduciary (Cook Islands) Limited to act as a trustee company, and its September 2026 list carried ten names. Unlicensed trustee company business is an offense under the Trustee Companies Act 2014, and a convicted company faces a fine of up to NZD 150,000.

Every license carries the same conditions. The regulations require paid-up share capital of at least NZD 250,000, professional indemnity insurance, an auditor approved by the Commission, and an annual compliance declaration filed with the audited financial statements. Directors and other key persons need the Commission’s prior approval as fit and proper persons. Ora meets the same licensing requirements as every other licensee, Southpac and Portcullis included.

Licensing also brings the Financial Transactions Reporting Act 2017 into every onboarding. Before accepting a trust, Ora must verify the identity, residential address, tax residency, and source of funds of the settlor and every other controlling person, and it must report suspicious activity to the Cook Islands Financial Intelligence Unit.

Services

Ora Fiduciary acts as trustee for international trusts and supplies the registered office and annual filings for Cook Islands LLCs. Cook Islands law requires every LLC to keep a registered agent that is itself a licensed trustee company, and an LLC without one is treated as suspended. The firm also registers international companies and foundations, supplies nominee directors and managers, and takes the protector role where a settlor prefers an institution to an individual.

Two offerings target advisors rather than settlors. A private trustee company lets a family form its own trustee entity, with Ora running compliance and administration behind it. A managed trustee company lets an advisor offer trustee services under the advisor’s own name while Ora handles the regulatory and administrative side. Ora also arranges banking introductions for the structures it administers.

Ora Private, the advisory arm, covers family governance, philanthropy, and international tax planning for high-net-worth families. A standard U.S. asset protection trust needs little of that. It is funded once and administered by the trustee, and the settlor’s accountant handles the tax reporting.

Digital Asset Custody

In May 2025, Ora announced a collaboration with Digital Wealth Partners, a U.S. investment advisory firm, to structure cryptocurrency holdings inside Cook Islands trusts and LLCs. Custody under that arrangement sits with Anchorage Digital, a qualified custodian using cold storage, multi-signature controls, and insurance.

Outside custody is one of several arrangements for cryptocurrency held in a Cook Islands trust. Institutional custody adds roughly $1,000 to $2,000 a year on top of the trustee’s fee. A settlor with large crypto holdings should confirm before signing who holds the keys and how a transfer is executed once the duress clause is triggered.

Fees

Ora does not publish a fee schedule on its website. Cook Islands trustees most often bill either by itemized charges or at a flat annual rate. Under itemized billing, annual administration averages about $5,000, and each distribution or additional gift to the trust is billed as it occurs, typically $750 to $1,000. Under a flat rate of about $7,000 a year, routine transactions are absorbed into the annual charge. Hourly work runs $200 to $500 an hour.

A settlor comparing Ora against a trustee that publishes its rates should ask for the full schedule, distribution charges and hourly rates included, before setting one annual figure against another. The lowest annual figure is not always the lowest cost across the trust’s life.

Considerations for U.S. Settlors

No U.S. court decision names Ora as the trustee of a trust under creditor attack. Southpac, by contrast, has run trusts through creditor litigation since the late 1990s, and a settlor already facing a judgment weighs that record heavily.

Trustees differ in their conduct when a creditor arrives. That event is rare, and it is the one the structure exists for. Once a U.S. judge orders repatriation, the trust deed’s duress clause requires the trustee to refuse the settlor’s instructions. A trustee that holds that line is the protection.

A U.S. settlor’s accountant handles the trust’s IRS reporting, so the working questions for a trustee are whether it produces year-end statements on the accountant’s timetable and whether it answers U.S. counsel promptly during litigation. Ora’s structuring lead is originally from California and knows the U.S. market. A settlor should still ask how many U.S. grantor trusts the Cook Islands office administers.

Ora fits a settlor who wants a trustee owned and run by Cook Islanders, who needs cryptocurrency held through an institutional custodian, or who works through an advisor that wants a white-label trustee arrangement. A settlor whose main worry is a creditor who has already sued weighs Southpac’s litigation record more heavily, and the choice of trustee turns on that worry first.