Beneficial Ownership
All registered companies are required to provide CIPA with beneficial ownership information pursuant to Section 21 and 345 of the Companies (Amendment) Act 2018, and in line with the Financial Intelligence Agency (FIA) Act. The legislation has assigned responsibility to CIPA to establish and maintain a register of beneficial ownership for companies. Pursuant to the FIA Act, a beneficial owner is defined as follows:
“beneficial owner” means a natural person who ultimately owns or controls a customer or a natural person on whose behalf a transaction is being conducted, including a natural person who exercises ultimate effective control over a legal person or arrangement, such that —
(a) in relation to a legal person —
(i) is a natural person who either directly or indirectly holds such percentage of shares, as may be prescribed, voting rights or other ownership interest:
Provided that to the extent that there is doubt as to whether the person identified hereunder is the beneficial owner or where no natural person is identified as the beneficial owner, the natural person exercising control of the legal person through other means shall be the beneficial owner, or
(ii) is a person who holds the position of senior managing official where no natural person was identified as a beneficial owner in terms of subparagraph (i);
(b) in relation to a trust, is –(i) the settlor,
(ii) a trustee,
(iii) a protector, if any,
(iv) a beneficiary of a trust, or a class of beneficiaries, where the individuals benefiting from the trust have yet to be determined, or
(v) any other natural person exercising ultimate effective control over the trust by means of direct or indirect ownership or by other means, such as when he or she has the power, alone or jointly with another person or with the consent of another person, to —
(aa) dispose of, advance, lend, invest, pay or apply trust property or property of the trust,
(bb) vary or terminate the trust,
(cc) add or remove a person as a beneficiary or from a class of beneficiaries,
(dd) appoint or remove a trustee or give another person control over the trust, or
(ee) direct, withhold consent or overrule the exercise of a power referred to in subparagraphs (aa) –
(dd);
(c) in relation to other legal arrangements similar to trusts, is the natural person holding equivalent or similar positions to those referred to in paragraph (b); and
(d) in the case of insurance, is the ultimate beneficiary of proceeds of a life insurance policy or other related investment services when an insured event covered by the policy occurs;