Improved doing business transparency with the Register of Beneficial Owners
The Register of Beneficial Owners (register) provides for transparency of the ownership structures of business entities and gives those companies bound by the Prevention of Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing Act (Zakon o preprečevanju pranja denarja in financiranja terorizma; ZPPDFT-1) access to relevant data for the purposes of customer due diligence measures. (i) corporate entities (companies, entrepreneurs, cooperatives); (ii) entities that do not have business shares (institutions, associations, institutes, political parties, trade unions, religious communities…); (iii) foreign funds, foreign institutions and similar legal entities of foreign law when tax liabilities arise in Republic of Slovenia must file their data with the register.
If they fulfil the conditions set out in the ZPPDFT-1, (i) sole proprietors; (ii) self-employed individuals, (iii) single-person LLC, (iv) direct and indirect budget beneficiaries, as well as (v) corporate entities on a regulated market which in accordance with EU legislation or comparable standards adhere to the disclosure requirement, which ensures proper transparency of ownership information; are not obliged to file their data with the register.
The beneficial owner of a corporate entity is any natural person, (i) who (in)directly holds at least 25% of the business share, voting rights or other rights on the basis of which he/she is a participant in the management of a legal person, or the ownership of 25% and one share; (ii) has a controlling interest in managing the assets of the corporate entity; or (iii) provides funds and, on this basis, has the opportunity to control, direct or otherwise significantly influence management decisions. If according to these criteria a natural person cannot be identified as a beneficial owner, one or more persons who occupy the position of management are regarded as the beneficial owner.
The data in the register will be partially public (personal name, residence, the amount of the ownership stake or the form of control of the beneficial owner and the date of registration and deletion of the beneficial owner). Companies bound by this measure under the ZPPDFT-1 shall have privileged access to all information on the beneficial owners when they conduct a customer due diligence, as well as the bodies for the detection and prosecution of criminal offenses, courts and supervisory bodies in the exercise of their powers and tasks related to ZPODFT- 1. Registration will consist of submitting an e-application via a web application on the AJPES portal. E-applications must be submitted by a representative of the business entity or it another person authorized to do so through the e-authorization system.
