Source: OJ L, 2024/1624, 19.6.2024Current language: EN
- Anti-money laundering
Basic legislative acts
- Anti-money laundering regulation (AMLR)
Article 79 Anonymous accounts and bearer shares and bearer share warrants
Summary What does Article 79 of the Anti-money laundering regulation (AMLR) say?
This article is a broad anti-anonymity provision that targets multiple instruments and structures that could be used to obscure identity in financial dealings.
It covers credit institutions, financial institutions, and crypto-asset service providers, prohibiting them from maintaining anonymous accounts of any kind, including bank accounts, passbooks, safe-deposit boxes, and crypto-asset accounts, as well as any account that enables anonymisation or obfuscation of transactions, explicitly including anonymity-enhancing coins.
The article also extends its reach beyond financial accounts to corporate structures, requiring companies to eliminate bearer shares — a classic tool for concealing ownership — and prohibiting the issuance of bearer share warrants not in intermediated form.
This article directly supports the customer due diligence framework established in Article 20, as anonymity fundamentally undermines the ability to identify customers and beneficial owners.
Important points:
- Do not keep or offer any form of anonymous account, passbook, safe-deposit box, or crypto-asset account, including any product that enables transaction obfuscation through anonymity-enhancing coins.
- Any existing anonymous accounts or safe-deposit boxes must be subjected to customer due diligence measures before they are used in any way.
- Companies are prohibited from issuing bearer shares and must convert, immobilise, or deposit all existing bearer shares with a financial institution by 10 July 2029, with voting rights and distribution rights automatically suspended for any shares not dealt with by that date.
Springlex's summary of the article, a reading aid, not a substitute for the legal text.
Credit institutions, financial institutions and crypto-asset service providers shall be prohibited from keeping anonymous bank and payment accounts, anonymous passbooks, anonymous safe-deposit boxes or anonymous crypto-asset accounts as well as any account otherwise allowing for the anonymisation of the customer account holder or the anonymisation or increased obfuscation of transactions, including through anonymity-enhancing coins.
Owners and beneficiaries of existing anonymous bank or payment accounts, anonymous passbooks, anonymous safe-deposit boxes held by credit institutions or financial institutions, or crypto-asset accounts shall be subject to customer due diligence measures before those accounts, passbooks, or deposit boxes are used in any way.
Credit institutions and financial institutions acting as acquirers within the meaning of Article 2, point (1), of Regulation (EU) 2015/751 of the European Parliament and of the Council(46) shall not accept payments carried out with anonymous prepaid cards issued in third countries, unless otherwise provided for in the regulatory technical standards adopted by the Commission in accordance with Article 28 of this Regulation on the basis of a proven low risk.
Companies shall be prohibited from issuing bearer shares, and shall convert all existing bearer shares into registered shares, shall immobilise them within the meaning of Article 2(1), point (3), of Regulation (EU) No 909/2014, or deposit them with a financial institution by 10 July 2029. However, companies with securities listed on a regulated market or whose shares are issued as intermediated securities either through immobilisation within the meaning of Article 2(1), point (3), of that Regulation or through a direct issuance in dematerialised form within the meaning of Article 2(1), point (4), of that Regulation shall be permitted to issue new and maintain existing bearer shares. For existing bearer shares that are not converted, immobilised or deposited by 10 July 2029, all voting rights and rights to distribution attached to those shares shall be automatically suspended until their conversion, immobilisation or deposit. All such shares not converted, immobilised or deposited by 10 July 2030 shall be cancelled, leading to a share capital decrease of the corresponding amount.
Companies shall be prohibited from issuing bearer share warrants that are not in intermediated form.
Springlex and this text is meant purely as a documentation tool and has no legal effect. No liability is assumed for its content. The authentic version of this act is the one published in the Official Journal of the European Union.
Definition
crypto-asset services
Definition
financial mixed activity holding company
Definition
crypto-asset service provider
Definition
credit institution
- a credit institution as defined in Article 4(1), point (1), of Regulation (EU) No 575/2013;
- a branch of a credit institution, as defined in Article 4(1), point (17), of Regulation (EU) No 575/2013, when located in the Union, whether its head office is located in a Member State or in a third country;
Definition
crypto-asset
Definition
property
Definition
financial institution
- an undertaking other than a credit institution or an investment firm, which carries out one or more of the activities listed in points (2) to (12), (14) and (15) of Annex I to Directive 2013/36/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council(32), including the activities of currency exchange offices (bureaux de change), but excluding the activities referred to in point (8) of Annex I to Directive (EU) 2015/2366, or an undertaking the principal activity of which is to acquire holdings, including a financial holding company, a mixed financial holding company and a financial mixed activity holding company;
- an insurance undertaking as defined in Article 13, point (1), of Directive 2009/138/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council(33), insofar as it carries out life or other investment-related assurance activities covered by that Directive, including insurance holding companies and mixed-activity insurance holding companies as defined, respectively, in Article 212(1), points (f) and (g), of Directive 2009/138/EC;
- an insurance intermediary as defined in Article 2(1), point (3), of Directive (EU) 2016/97 where it acts with respect to life insurance and other investment-related insurance services, with the exception of an insurance intermediary that does not collect premiums or amounts intended for the customer and which acts under the responsibility of one or more insurance undertakings or intermediaries for the products which concern them respectively;
- an investment firm as defined in Article 4(1), point (1), of Directive 2014/65/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council(34);
- a collective investment undertaking, in particular:
- an undertaking for collective investment in transferable securities (UCITS) as defined in Article 1(2) of Directive 2009/65/EC and its management company as defined in Article 2(1), point (b), of that Directive or an investment company authorised in accordance with that Directive and which has not designated a management company, that makes available for purchase units of UCITS in the Union;
- an alternative investment fund as defined in Article 4(1), point (a), of Directive 2011/61/EU and its alternative investment fund manager as defined in Article 4(1), point (b), of that Directive that fall within the scope set out in Article 2 of that Directive;
- a central securities depository as defined in Article 2(1), point (1), of Regulation (EU) No 909/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council(35);
- a creditor as defined in Article 4, point (2), of Directive 2014/17/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council(36) and in Article 3, point (b), of Directive 2008/48/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council(37);
- a credit intermediary as defined in Article 4, point (5), of Directive 2014/17/EU and in Article 3, point (f), of Directive 2008/48/EC, when holding the funds as defined in Article 4, point (25), of Directive (EU) 2015/2366 in connection with the credit agreement, with the exception of the credit intermediary carrying out activities under the responsibility of one or more creditors or credit intermediaries;
- a crypto-asset service provider;
- a branch of a financial institution referred to in points (a) to (i), when located in the Union, whether its head office is located in a Member State or in a third country;
Definition
third country
Definition
anonymity-enhancing coins
Definition
crypto-asset account
Definition
funds
Footnote 46