Beneficial owners
Last updated: 7 November 2024.
The Register of Beneficial Owners has opened for registration.
Businesses and other legal persons can from this date onwards register information about beneficial owners.
Beneficial owners are natural persons who in the last instance own or control an organisation. The organisation can have one, several or no beneficial owners.
To make sure businesses have time to identify and obtain information, there will be a phasing time of ten months. The obligation to register beneficial owners takes effect on 1 October 2024, but the rule regarding the coercive fine does not apply until 31 July 2025.
The Register of Beneficial Owners has been established as a measure to counter money laundering, terrorist financing, and economic crime. The purpose of the register is to provide an overview of who actually controls businesses.
Both the Register on Beneficial Owners Act and the Money Laundering Act use the term beneficial owners, but have slightly different criteria to identify a beneficial owner.