Art. 62 Beneficial ownership information | Anti-money laundering regulation (AMLR) | AML

This article establishes the content standard for beneficial ownership information and the timelines for obtaining and maintaining it.

It acts as a foundational reference point for the broader beneficial ownership transparency framework, defining precisely what information must be held and kept current by legal entities and trustees of express trusts or persons in equivalent positions in similar legal arrangements.

The article sets out a detailed list of what constitutes adequate beneficial ownership information, covering personal identification details of the beneficial owner, the nature and extent of their interest, and, where ownership structures are layered, a description of those structures and the relationships within them.

Important points:

Legal entities and trustees of express trusts (or equivalent persons in similar legal arrangements) must ensure beneficial ownership information held, provided to obliged entities, or submitted to central registers is adequate, accurate, and up-to-date.
Obtain the required beneficial ownership information within 28 calendar days of the creation of the legal entity or the setting up of the legal arrangement, and update it within 28 calendar days of any change, as well as on an annual basis.
The required information is comprehensive, covering personal identification of the beneficial owner, the nature and extent of their interest, details of the legal entity or arrangement, and, where applicable, a full description of any layered ownership or control structure.

1. Legal entities and trustees of express trusts or persons holding equivalent positions in similar legal arrangements shall ensure that the beneficial ownership information which they hold, provide to obliged entities in the context of customer due diligence procedures in accordance with Chapter III or submit to central registers is adequate, accurate, and up-to-date.
2. The beneficial ownership information referred to in the first subparagraph shall include the following:
  1. all names and surnames, place and full date of birth, residential address, country of residence and nationality or nationalities of the beneficial owner, number of identity document, such as passport or national identity document, and, where it exists, unique personal identification number assigned to the person by his or her country of usual residence, and general description of the source of such number;
  2. the nature and extent of the beneficial interest held in the legal entity or legal arrangement, whether through ownership interest or control via other means, as well as the date as of which the beneficial interest is held;
  3. information on the legal entity of which the natural person is the beneficial owner in accordance with Article 22(1), point (b), or, in the case of legal arrangements of which the natural person is the beneficial owner, basic information on the legal arrangement;
  4. where the ownership and control structure contains more than one legal entity or legal arrangement, a description of such structure, including names and, where it exists, identification numbers of the individual legal entities or legal arrangements that are part of that structure, and a description of the relationships between them, including the share of the interest held;
  5. where a class of beneficiaries is identified under Article 59, general description of the characteristic of the class of beneficiaries;
  6. where objects of a power and default takers are identified under Article 60:
    for natural persons, their names and surnames;
    for legal entities and legal arrangements, their names;
    for a class of objects of a power or default takers, its description.
1. Legal entities and trustees of express trusts or persons holding an equivalent position in a similar legal arrangement shall obtain adequate, accurate, and up-to-date beneficial ownership information within 28 calendar days of the creation of the legal entity or the setting up of the legal arrangement. That information shall be updated promptly, and, in any case, within 28 calendar days of any change thereto, as well as on an annual basis.