Recital 104

(104) The concept of beneficial ownership was introduced to increase transparency of complex corporate structures. The need to access accurate, up-to-date and adequate information on the beneficial owner is a key factor in tracing criminals who might otherwise be able to hide their identity behind such opaque structures. Member States are currently required to ensure that corporate and other legal entities, as well as express trusts and other similar legal arrangements, obtain and hold adequate, accurate and up-to-date information on their beneficial ownership. However, the degree of transparency imposed by Member States varies. The rules are subject to divergent interpretations, and that results in different methods to identify beneficial owners of a given legal entity or legal arrangement. This is due, inter alia, to inconsistent methods of calculating indirect ownership of a legal entity or legal arrangement, and differences between the legal systems of the Member States. This hampers the transparency that was intended to be achieved. It is therefore necessary to clarify the rules to achieve a consistent definition of beneficial owner and its application across the internal market.

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Source: EUR-Lex CELLAR · retrieved 2026-09-04 · Text as adopted (Official Journal); later amendments are not incorporated in this text.