§12111 Registry Endorsement

Summary

A registry endorsement can be given to a vessel that meets the rules in section 12103. A vessel with that endorsement can do foreign trade and trade with Guam, American Samoa, Wake, Midway, or Kingman Reef. A certificate of documentation that only has a registry endorsement can be issued even if the trust’s beneficiaries are not U.S. citizens, as long as the trust meets certain rules and the vessel is chartered to a U.S. citizen. The trust rules say each trustee must be a U.S. citizen and must sign an affidavit saying they do not know of any non‑U.S. person who could hold more than 25 percent of the power to influence or limit the trustee about ownership or operation that could hurt U.S. interests. If a non‑U.S. person can direct or help remove a trustee without cause, the trust must limit non‑U.S. control to 25 percent or less. Those rules do not stop non‑U.S. people from owning more than 25 percent of the benefits of the trust. If the charterer is a U.S. citizen under section 50501, the vessel is treated as U.S.‑owned for that section and related laws, except chapter 531. Only vessels with a certificate of documentation and a registry endorsement can set, move, or recover anchors or mooring gear for mobile offshore drilling units over the Outer Continental Shelf (see section 2(a) of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act (43 U.S.C. 1331(a))). Only those vessels can carry goods or people between the United States and a mobile offshore drilling unit that is not attached to the seabed. That permission does not let a vessel work in coastwise trade unless it also meets the requirements of section 12112.