Proposal to Strengthen the Registration of Ultimate Beneficial Owners
Published 13 March 2019
Category: Corporate Regulation
On 13 March 2019, the Danish Government presented a proposal for an amendment of various acts including the Danish Companies Act which implements part of the 5th EU Anti-Money Laundering Directive concerning the registration of ultimate beneficial owners.
Amongst key changes, the proposal makes it mandatory for capital owners and others with direct or indirect control to provide the company with information necessary to identity their ultimate beneficial owners and further makes it mandatory for companies to supply this information to persons and companies which are required to carry out KYC procedures.
Insufficient registrations or lack of documentation for the registrations (or lack of registrations) may be grounds for compulsory dissolution of the company. Further it is proposed to obligate for companies to make a yearly assessment of whether there are any changes of the ultimate beneficial owners, the results of which are to be presented on the meeting where the central management approves of the annual report.
Next Steps: The proposal is expected to be adopted by the Danish Parliament on 2 May 2019 and, if enacted, the changes will enter into force from 10 January 2020.
The proposal is available here.
Tags: Beneficial OwnershipComplianceDanish RegulationDisclosure RequirementsKYC / AML
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