Beneficial Ownership Register FAQ

The European Union (EU) has legislated for a number of Anti-Money Laundering Directives ("AML Directives"), also known as the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter Terrorism Financing Directives. The more recent Directives which are relevant to this Register are:

• EU Directive 2015/849, the 4th Anti Money Laundering Directive (“4AMLD”)
• EU Directive 2018/843, the 5th Anti Money Laundering Directive ("5AMLD") (made amendments to 4AMLD)

The Criminal Justice Act (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) (Amendment) Act 2018 transposes the majority of 4AMLD into National Law.

The relevant Statutory Instruments are:

• S.I. No 110 of 2019 – European Union (Anti-Money Laundering: Beneficial Ownership of Corporate Entities) Regulations 2019;
• S.I. No 233 of 2020 – European Union (Modifications of Statutory Instrument No. 110 of 2019) (Registration of Beneficial Ownership of Certain Financial Vehicles) Regulations 2020 transpose the relevant aspects of 4AMLD and 5AMLD associated with beneficial ownership registers;

• S.I. No 321 of 2021 - European Union (Modifications of Statutory Instrument No. 110 of 2019) (Registration of Beneficial Ownership of Certain Financial Vehicles) (Amendment) Regulations 2021.

• S.I. No 308 of 2023 - European Union (Anti - Money Laundering: Beneficial Ownership of Corporate Entities) (Amendment) Regulations 2023

This information and links to the relevant websites above are provided by the Central Bank for guidance only, and are not a legal interpretation of the SI or the EU Directives. If in doubt in respect of your legal obligations you should seek your own legal advice.

The purpose of the Register is to deter Money Laundering (ML) and Terrorist Financing (TF) and to identify those that seek to hide their ownership and control of corporate or legal entities by ensuring that the ultimate owners/controllers of ICAVs, Credit Unions, Unit Trusts, Investment Limited Partnerships and Common Contractual Funds are identified and that this information is readily accessible to law enforcement, regulators and obliged entities.

The Minister for Finance has tasked the Central Bank of Ireland with responsibility for establishing a Central Beneficial Ownership Register in respect of CFV.

Yes. The Register has been established under anti-money laundering legislation.

No. CFV are required to maintain their own internal register of Beneficial Ownership as required by Regulation 15 in S.I. 110 of 2019. This is separate from the requirement that they must also file the same Beneficial Ownership information on the Central Beneficial Ownership Register for CFV.

CFV must keep details of their Beneficial Ownership up to date at all times. Any changes to Beneficial Ownership details must be updated to this Register within 14 days of the change occurring, as per Regulation 10 (S.I. 110 of 2019).

It is the responsibility of CFV and those that manage them to ensure that the beneficial ownership information is filed on the CFV Register.

Failure to comply with these requirements is a breach of statutory duties and a criminal offence which is subject to sanctions.

CFV are legally obliged under S.I. No. 233 of 2020 and S.I. 110 of 2019 to maintain "adequate, accurate and current information in respect of its beneficial owners".

Regulation 24(9) of S.I. No 110 of 2019 states that the CFV’s internal register of beneficial owners must be available for inspection by any member of the Garda Síochána, the Revenue Commissioners, a competent authority, or the Criminal Assets Bureau.

Regulation 25 of SI 110 of 2019 provides that the public and designated persons shall have a right of access to certain information contained in the Register*.

• Access requests can be made by completing a BOR 4 Form and submitting to [email protected]. Independent evidence of active designated person status must also be provided with the completed form, following which the request will be processed.  

• Access requests are made in respect of a CFV and beneficial ownership information held on the Register in relation to that CFV will be provided. A separate request must be made in respect of each CFV (i.e. multiple CFV cannot be included in a single access request). Access requests are only facilitated by CFV, not by beneficial owner.

* Further to a ruling by the European Court of Justice regarding public access to beneficial ownership registers [ECJ No.188 of 2022],Regulation 25 of the principal regulations is amended by S.I. 308 of 2023. Access requests by members of the public must meet a threshold of legitimate interest, as provided in Regulation 4 of S.I. 308 of 2023.

The following information is available in respect of beneficial owners of a CFV:

• Forename and Surname
• Month and Year of birth
• Country of residence
• Nationality
• A statement of the nature and extent of the beneficial interest held or control exercised.

Regulations 24 and 25 of SI 110 of 2019 provides for two types of access to the beneficial ownership information contained in the Register – "unrestricted" and "restricted" access.

Unrestricted Access

All details contained on the Register are available to certain competent authorities. Regulation 24 in SI No 110 of 2019 provides full details on this. The competent authorities include:

• an Garda Síochána
• the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) Ireland
• the Revenue Commissioners
• the Criminal Assets Bureau (CAB)
• the Central Bank of Ireland.
• the Department of Justice & Equality.
• the Property Services Regulatory Authority (PSRA).
• the Law Society of Ireland.
• the General Council of the Bar of Ireland.
• a designated accountancy body (within the meaning of Part 4 of the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering & Terrorist Financing) Act 2010

and

• an inspector appointed by the Director of Corporate Enforcement under section 764(1) of the Companies Act 2014.

The Garda Síochána, Revenue Commissioners, competent authorities and CAB may disclose the information in the central register to any corresponding competent authority of another Member State (Regulation 24(9), SI 110/2019).

Restricted access

Only certain information contained in the Register is available to the general public* and designated persons in accordance with Regulation No 25 of SI No 110 of 2019. This information is:

• Name of the CFV
• Beneficial Owner(s) - Name; Nationality; Country of Residence; Month and Year of Birth; Nature of Beneficial Ownership held

Designated persons are defined in the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) Act 2010 (No 6 of 2010). They include financial institutions, accountants, auditors, tax advisers, legal professionals, and dealers in expensive goods (such as houses, cars, jewellery, etc.). Designated Persons are required to conduct background information checks on individuals or entities they enter into a financial transaction or a business relationship with, under general AML legislation. SI No. 110 of 2019 requires, inter alia, that when a designated person enters into an occasional transaction with a relevant entity (i.e. a Certain Financial Vehicle), the CFV shall provide certain beneficial ownership to the Designated Person (Regulation 5(8)) and the Designated Person is also granted restricted access to the Register (Regulation 25).  Following ECJ Ruling No.188 of 2022 access is only granted to designated persons on receipt of a BOR 4 Form and supplementary independent evidence of designated person status, per access request.

*Further to a ruling by the European Court of Justice regarding public access to beneficial ownership registers [ECJ No.188 of 2022], Regulation 25 of the principal regulations is amended by S.I. 308 of 2023. Access requests by members of the public must meet a threshold of legitimate interest, as provided in Regulation 4 of S.I. 308 of 2023.

Yes. Where the beneficial owner is a MINOR (i.e. under 18 years of age), Regulation 25(5) of S.I. 110/2019 requires that their beneficial ownership details be exempt from direct access by designated persons and members of the public*. If a designated person or member of the public wishes to access beneficial ownership information relating to a minor, they may submit a request in writing, to the Registrar (i.e. Central Bank) including a summary of the grounds on which he/she considers it is in the public interest that that information be disclosed to him or her.

*Further to a ruling by the European Court of Justice regarding public access to beneficial ownership registers [ECJ No.188 of 2022], access requests by members of the public will not be processed, pending clarification of the legislative position by the law making body.

A member of the public must demonstrate that they have a legitimate interest to inspect the Register. The following must be demonstrated to the Registrar in a relevant submission:

• that the person seeking the information is engaged in the prevention, detection or investigation of money laundering or terrorist financing offences,
• that the person is seeking to inspect the information for the purposes of an activity in which he or she is engaged, as referred to in subparagraph above (but such activity need not necessarily relate to cases of pending administrative or legal proceedings in respect of the relevant entity concerned), and
• that the relevant entity concerned – (i) is connected with persons convicted (whether in the State or elsewhere) of an offence consisting of money laundering or terrorist financing, or (ii) holds assets in a high-risk third country.

The Registrar will consider each submission on a case-by-case basis.

Please email [email protected] with the following details:

• BOR 5 Form - Legitimate Interest
• supporting information as outlined in the BOR 5 Form

A Beneficial Owner is defined in Article 3(6) of 4AMLD, as any natural person(s) who ultimately owns or controls a legal entity, either through direct or indirect ownership of a sufficient percentage of the shares or voting rights or ownership interest in the entity, including through bearer shareholdings, or through control via other means.

These include:

• ownership (directly or indirectly) of more than 25% of the company/society's shares
• controlling (directly or indirectly) more than 25% of the company/society's voting rights
• control via other means which is explained in Recital 13 of 4AMLD as follows:

“Control through other means" may, inter alia, include the criteria of control used for the purpose of preparing consolidated financial statements, such as

• through a shareholders' agreement,
• the exercise of dominant influence or
• the power to appoint senior management

If an entity falling within the meaning of CFV is a subsidiary owned by another corporate or other legal entity, any natural person(s) who holds or controls a shareholding of 25% plus one share, or an ownership interest of more than 25% in the parent entity, is a beneficial owner(s) of the subsidiary.

If an entity falling within the meaning of Certain Financial Vehicle is a subsidiary owned by multiple corporate or other legal entities, Article 3(6) of 4AMLD, states that a shareholding of 25% plus one share or an ownership interest of more than 25% in a subsidiary held by multiple corporate or other legal entities which are under the control of the same natural person(s), shall be an indication of indirect beneficial ownership.

Ultimately, it is a natural person(s) who must be identified and entered on the Register as the beneficial owner(s) of the entity, irrespective of how many layers of ownership exist.

If, after having exhausted all possible means and provided there are no grounds for suspicion, no natural person is identified as a beneficial owner, or if there is any doubt that the person(s) identified are the beneficial owner(s), the natural person(s) who hold the position of Senior Managing Official(s) shall be recorded on the Register as the beneficial owner.

Senior Managing Official is defined in S.I. 110 of 2019 which states that it "includes a director and a chief executive officer". Accordingly, the Central Bank expects that when recording Senior Managing Officials it includes at a minimum a Director and Manager/CEO, and would expect that the Chairperson is included among Directors recorded. It is ultimately a matter for a CFV to interpret this requirement, and record additional senior management or directors as Senior Managing Officials as they see fit.

Further details on how to include senior managing official information in the submission template is set out at the end of this FAQ.

Unit Trusts

In respect of Unit Trusts, the definition of beneficial owner is set out in Regulation 4 of S.I. 233 of 2020. By virtue of the definition, the following applies:

1. A natural person must be identified in accordance with limbs (a) or (b) of the definition.
2. The trustee/settlor whether they are a natural person or a corporate entity must also be identified.

In respect of limb (b) of the definition, a natural person must be registered who exercises "ultimate control over the entity by means of direct or indirect ownership or by other means". Ultimately, it is a matter for each party to determine who this is but may be a person in the trustee or management company who, in respect of the unit trust, exercises such a role. For example, the most senior PCF in the trustee firm or management company.

Therefore, details of:

• the natural person(s) in 1 above; and
• the trustee/settlor (as applicable) in 2 above;

should be included in the submission to the register. Further details on how to include these details in the submission template is set out at the end of this FAQ.

Note:

• As set out above it is a matter for CFV to identify their beneficial owners. CFV are required to maintain their own internal register of beneficial ownership, and the details submitted to the Central Beneficial Ownership Register should be consistent with what is recorded on the CFV's internal register.
• Regulation 5(5) of S.I. 110 of 2019 – requires that CFV shall keep records of the actions taken to identify their beneficial owners.

• If in doubt, CFV should seek legal advice to assist it in establishing who its beneficial owners are.

Guidance for submitting Senior Managing Official details in submission template:

When completing the beneficial ownership template, the following guidance should be followed when completing information fields in respect of Senior Managing Officials:

• Nature of interest/control - Select 'Senior Managing Official' from the drop down menu.
• Is the Person's interest / control direct or indirect? – ‘N/A’ must be selected.
• Extent of interest/control: % owned or controlled: - this should be left blank.
• Further information / clarification in relation to nature / extent of ownership / control:- this cell is mandatory and can be used to provide further details.

Guidance for Unit Trusts when completing submission template:

Trustee/Settlors

• If the Trustee/Settlor is a corporate/legal entity, use the following field to record details: Further information / clarification in relation to nature / extent of ownership / control:
• and provide the following information as relevant - Legal name, Registered Office, Central Bank Institution Code, Companies Registration Office number.

Article 3(6) of 4AMLD, states that a shareholding of 25% plus one share or an ownership interest of more than 25% in a subsidiary held by multiple corporate or other legal entities which are under the control of the same natural person(s), shall be an indication of indirect beneficial ownership.

For example should a natural person with shares in a CFV amount to 25% or less of the value of the shares, they are not deemed to be a Beneficial Owner. However if the natural person has 25% of the shares plus one additional share, then they are a Beneficial Owner and their details must be registered on the Central Register of CFV.

Control "by other means" is defined by Article 3(6), 4AMLD, as “Control through other means may be determined, inter alia, in accordance with the criteria in Article 22(1) to (5) of Directive 2013/34/EU of the European Parliament and of the Council ……. on the annual financial statements, consolidated financial statements and related reports of certain types of undertakings,”

The Directive also states that control via other means can be defined as follows:

"Control through other means may, inter alia, include the criteria of control used for the purpose of preparing consolidated financial statements, such as

• through a shareholders' agreement
• the exercise of dominant influence or
• the power to appoint senior management"

The Central Bank advises that CFV seek their own legal advice for direction in establishing who their Beneficial Owners are.

The Directive and Regulations 5(2) of SI 110/2019 states that "all reasonable steps" should be taken to establish who the natural person Beneficial Owner is.

The steps involved include:

• giving notice under Regulations 6 & 7 of SI 110 of 2019 to any natural person(s) that the CFV or its presenter has reasonable cause to believe to be a beneficial owner. Once issued, the natural person(s) to whom this notice has been issued has one month to provide the necessary details; or
• giving notice under Regulations 8 & 9 of SI 110 of 2019 to any person(s) that the CFV or its presenter has reasonable cause to believe to have knowledge of that set out in Regulation 9. Once issued, the person(s) to whom this notice has been issued has one month to provide the necessary details.

Failure by the natural person to reply and cooperate with the CFV or to make a false statement is a criminal offence.

Where all reasonable steps to identify the beneficial owners have been exhausted unsuccessfully, the Regulations provide that the Senior Managing Officials (e.g. the Director(s) or CEO) shall be deemed the beneficial owners. CFV shall keep records of the actions taken to identify their beneficial owners (pursuant to Regulation 5(5) of SI 110 of 2019).

Regulation 2 of SI 110 of 2019 defines a "senior managing official" as including a director and a chief executive officer.

Where a CFV is in liquidation, the appointed liquidator is expected to be a listed Senior Managing Official (SMO) for the CFV, replacing all other SMO. Upon submission of information pertaining to the appointment of a liquidator as a SMO for the CFV to the Beneficial Ownership Register, the following reporting rules should be observed when completing the reporting template:

• All SMO that the appointed liquidator is replacing must all have a ceased date entered in the field “date on which the person has left the entity’s internal register as a beneficial owner” of the reporting template.  
• Information in respect of the liquidator, who is a named individual, should be entered and should NOT have a ceased date entered until such time as the liquidator ceases to be a liquidator for the CFV, or the liquidator is replaced by another individual.
• In the field “Further information/clarification in relation to nature/extent of ownership/control” the following text should be included:  “SMO as a result of being appointed liquidator of this CFV”
• Any other information the liquidator deems relevant to the appointment should also be included in the field “Further information/clarification in relation to nature/extent of ownership/control”.

CFV’s are reminded to seek legal advice to assist it in establishing who its beneficial owners are.

A Designated Person is defined in Section 25 of the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorism Financing) Act 2010, as amended by the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) (Amendment) Act 2018.

The following information is required to be submitted:

•  Name
• Date of Birth
• PPS Number
• Central Bank of Ireland reference number (as applicable to Non-PPSN holders)
• Nationality
• Address
• Nature of interest / control
• Is the Person's interest / control direct or indirect?
• Extent of interest / control: % owned or controlled
• Further information / clarification in relation to nature / extent of ownership / control
• Date on which the person was entered into the entity's internal register as a beneficial owner
• Date on which the person left the entity’s internal register as a beneficial owner (where applicable)

CFV and their agents should be aware of their responsibilities under GDPR legislation for safeguarding any personal data they hold in respect of its beneficial owners.

CFV should seek their own legal advice to ensure compliance in this regard.

Regulation 21(2) of S.I. 110 of 2019 (as amended) and sections 52 and 63 of Investment Limited Partnership Act 2020 provide for the collection of the PPS number of each beneficial owner, for the purpose of verification of the information delivered to the register.

The information entered in the register will be compared with Department of Social Protection (DSP) database. The Date of Birth and PPSN provided will be checked for a 100% match against the DSP database by comparing the forename and surname returned from the DSP against the forename and surname of the beneficial owner entered in the Beneficial Ownership Information Return.

Where the validation protocol does not provide a 100% match, the return will be set to ‘Invalid’ status on ONR. Details of the validation error(s) will be provided automatically by email to the  ONR user. Where such discrepancies arise, the  ONR user should notify the beneficial owner, who in turn must contact the Department of Social Protection directly at [email protected] in order to resolve the discrepancy.

Where a validation error occurs relating to the CBI reference number provided, the return will be set to ‘Invalid’ status on ONR. Details of the validation error(s) will be provided automatically by email to the ONR user. The ONR user must ensure that the details provided via the BOR V2 submission align with the details pertaining to the CBI reference number, as per the PCF Information Return on ONR.

Once the PPSN has been validated, the PPSN will be retained securely in an irreversible hashed format and the original submitted PPSN will be deleted after validation.

Where a beneficial owner(s) of a CFV has not been assigned a PPSN, but the individual(s) has/have been previously appointed in a Pre-Approval Controlled Function (PCF), as required under Fitness and Probity Standards, the corresponding CBI reference number obtained under this process may be provided on the Beneficial Ownership Information Return. This serves as an alternative to PPSN (i.e. only where the Beneficial Owner has not been granted a PPS number), given that verification of information has previously been established as part of the Fitness and Probity regime.

Where neither a PPSN nor a CBI reference number is available for the beneficial owner(s) of a CFV, a Declaration as to Verification of Identity Form must be completed by the Beneficial Owner, and uploaded via the Verification of Identity Return by the CFV’s presenter, on behalf of each beneficial owner. View further information on the Verification of Identity process.

The RBO number cannot be used for the purpose of reporting to the Central Bank of Ireland Beneficial Ownership Register of Certain Financial Vehicles. Reporting to each register is mutually exclusive, therefore the RBO number is required for reporting to RBO and CBI reference number is required for reporting to the Beneficial Ownership Register of Certain Financial Vehicles, where PPSN information is not available for beneficial owners.

There is no requirement to provide this date for historic beneficial owners. The obligation to report a Beneficial Owner’s date of leaving a CFV’s internal register commences on 07 December 2021. For subsequent flings, after the initial filing of the new Beneficial Ownership Template from 07 December 2021, where a beneficial owner is no longer a beneficial owner, that should be reflected by including a cessation date on the Beneficial Ownership Template against that individual. New and continuing (i.e. current) beneficial owners must always be listed on every Beneficial Ownership Template submitted. An outgoing beneficial owner must only be listed once alongside the current beneficial owners in order to record the cessation date on the Beneficial Ownership Register.

A Beneficial Owner should be reported ceased once – alongside all current beneficial owners –  within 14 calendar days of the beneficial ownership coming to an end. There is no ongoing requirement to continue to report the ceased status or any other information for that individual from that point forward. Should the same individual become a beneficial owner again in the future for that CFV, they should be included again without a ceased date, alongside all current beneficial owners, until such a time they cease being a beneficial owner.

Where a beneficial owner is no longer a beneficial owner of a CFV, the date at which they ceased being a beneficial owner must be provided. A Beneficial Owner should be ceased once within 14 calendar days of beneficial ownership ending, and where this cessation date is reported after the point of collection of PPSN/CBI reference numbers i.e. 11 November 2022, a PPSN will be required for the ceased beneficial owner.  Subsequent submissions capturing new and continuing (i.e. current) beneficial owners must always be listed on every Beneficial Ownership Return submitted, and will require a PPSN/CBI reference number to be provided from the point of PPSN/CBI reference number collection in November 2022. 

S.I. No. 233 of 2020 states the CFV  (Irish Collective Asset-Management Vehicle, Unit Trust, Credit Union) that are required to maintain up to date beneficial ownership details on the Register. Further the Investment Limited Partnership (Amendment) Act 2020 provides that Investment Limited Partnerships and Common Contractual Funds are required to report beneficial ownership information to the register.

The Central Bank publishes, and updates on a monthly basis, the list of Certain Financial Vehicles (CFV) for whom beneficial ownership information is available on the Beneficial Ownership Register of Certain Financial Vehicles, for which the Central Bank holds responsibility, following the transposition of relevant articles of the European AML Directives 4 and 5, under S.I. 233 of 2020. Currently, the certain financial vehicles contained on the register managed by the Central Bank of Ireland are:

• Irish Collective Asset-Management Vehicles (ICAV)
• Unit Trusts
• Credit Unions
• Investment Limited Partnerships
• Common Contractual Funds

S.I. 110 of 2019 transposed relevant articles of 4AMLD and 5AMLD that require companies and industrial and provident societies to maintain an internal register of their beneficial owners and to file this information with a central register, responsibility for which was conferred on the Registrar of Companies, under which the Register of Beneficial Ownership operates.

S.I. 194 of 2021 transposed relevant articles of 4AMLD and 5AMLD that require a central register of beneficial ownership of trusts to be established, and for which responsibility was conferred on the Revenue Commissioners.

Further information in relation to the Register of Beneficial Ownership of Companies and Industrial and Provident Societies is available at https://rbo.gov.ie/.

Further information in relation to the Central Register of Beneficial Ownership of Trusts is available at https://www.revenue.ie/en/crbot/index.aspx.

An officer or employee of a CFV can complete the registration process on the Central Bank’s Online Reporting (ONR) system.

Beneficial ownership information may be submitted to the Central Bank by a person (defined in accordance with Regulation 22(1) of S.I. No 110 of 2019, as the "presenter") acting on behalf of the CFV.

The "presenter" will be required to submit the following details on the return's spreadsheet (in addition to the CFV's beneficial ownership details):

• Name of Presenter
• Address of Presenter
• Phone number of Presenter
• Email address of Presenter
• Capacity in which the Presenter is acting
• If the presenter is not a natural person, please enter the name, address, phone number and e-mail address of a natural person for correspondence purposes.

To register the beneficial ownership information a submission form is available on the Central Bank website which must be completed. All fields in this form must be completed or the form will not be accepted by the Online Reporting system.

Please click on the ONR system to upload the form, following on screen instructions.

A guidance document is available on the submit details to register link which highlights the stages involved in submission. Please ensure you read this document in advance of completing/submitting the form.

Please contact [email protected] if you are experiencing difficulty in making a submission to the register.

No – all submissions must be made through the Central Bank’s Online Return's (ONR) system using the required form. If personal details are submitted by hard copy to the Central Bank, these will be destroyed in line with GDPR legislation. CFV will be informed of this should they post in details and their obligation to submit beneficial ownership details will be deemed unfulfilled.

A submission may be rejected if the mandatory fields have not been completed or if the submission is not filed by the end of the six-month deadline.

All fields are mandatory with the exception of Address Line 2 and Address Line 3.

The form requests confirmation of whether a beneficial owner is also the holder of Pre-Approval Control Function (PCF) role. Where a beneficial owner is also a PCF role holder, it is expected that similar information will be consistent and where this is not the case the Central Bank will follow-up as appropriate.

The submission will not be accepted if any of the following aspects of the form have been altered:

• Removal of the security protection on the file
• Renaming the worksheets
• Adding or deleting the worksheets
• Adding or deleting columns within the worksheets

If the file is uploaded where any of the above is not adhered to an error message will be sent specifying the specific error. You will be required to log back into ONR and re-submit the file with the error corrected.

When a successful submission is uploaded a confirmation will be provided to the CFV.

In order to ensure your submission is complete, please make certain that your submission has been successfully signed off.

Submissions that are on Accepted or Valid are not complete and are still outstanding. Please see guidance document for further information (PDF).

Yes. All CFV must submit details of their beneficial ownership to the Register with six months of them becoming authorised or registered (as appropriate).

As provided for in the European Union (Modifications of Statutory Instrument No. 110 of 2019) (Registration of Beneficial Ownership of Certain Financial Vehicles) Regulations 2020 (S.I. No 233 of 2020), in respect of Irish Collective Asset-management Vehicles, Credit Unions and Unit Trusts, the Central Bank is legally required to recoup any costs arising from implementation and operation of the Register of Beneficial Ownership of Certain Financial Vehicles (CFV) and cannot fund such costs from its own resources. Sections 38(3) and 61(3) of the Investment Limited Partnership (Amendment) Act 2020 also provide for the Central Bank to recoup any costs arising from the implementation and operation of the Register in respect of Investment Limited Partnerships and Common Contractual Funds.

CFV are required to pay a levy in respect of 2023 costs of the Beneficial Ownership Register in 2024. Details of the levy process have been communicated to CFV.

All Irish Collective Asset Management Vehicles, Credit Unions and Unit Trusts, Investment Limited Partnerships and Common Contractual Funds which held a registration or authorisation in the levy period, are eligible to pay the levy for the period 2023, which will be invoiced in July 2024.

The levy can be paid by Electronic Fund Transfer to the account details below:

Bank Identifier Code:   DABAIE2D

IBAN   :   IE19DABA95199010002216

Account Name: CFV Levy Account

Reference Information Required: Please include the customer account number and/or invoice number shown to enable us to allocate the payment to your account. Otherwise, we will be obliged to return the payment, which may result in bank charges. All information to be relayed to the beneficiary (customer/invoice no.) should be populated in the correct fields on the payment:

• SEPA Payment: Remittance Information field(Unstructured Remittance tag in an XML file - <Ustrd>)
• MT103:field 70

Where possible, one payment should be made for each invoice (and not multiple payments per invoice).

The levy amount is based on the costs incurred by the Central Bank of Ireland to establish and operate the Beneficial Ownership Register in 2023 Costs are internally verified and subject to external audit, and once final, these costs  for the relevant period are shared across the number of eligible Irish Collective Asset-management Vehicles, Unit Trusts, Credit Unions, Investment Limited Partnerships and Common Contractual Funds as at 31 December of the financial year to which the costs apply, to determine the levy amount for the relevant period.

Payment is required within 28 calendar days of the invoice date.

Payment related queries should be directed to the Billing & Collections Team – [email protected].   All other queries should be directed to [email protected].

 

S.I. 110 of 2019 provides for discrepancies to be reported to the Registrar (i.e. Central Bank) by a designated person or a competent authority.

 Regulation 20(3)(b) of SI 110 of 2019 states that if a designated person carrying out customer due diligence on Certain Financial Vehicles (CFV), or otherwise, forms the opinion that there is a discrepancy between the information in the Register and the information the CFV must hold in its internal register of beneficial ownership, then the designated person shall deliver, in a timely manner, to the Registrar (“the Central Bank”) notice of that opinion, specifying the particulars of the discrepancy it has noted.

Regulation 26(1) states that if a competent authority forms the opinion that there is a discrepancy between the information relating to a relevant entity (i.e. CFV) in the Register, and other beneficial ownership information available to the competent authority relating to the same CFV, to the extent that it does not interfere unnecessarily with the performance of the functions of the competent authority, the competent authority shall deliver, in a timely manner to the Registrar, notice of that opinion specifying the particulars of the discrepancy.

A Discrepancy Notice is a formal notification to the Registrar of a discrepancy, as explained above, by a Designated Person or relevant person in a competent authority.

Only a person who is either an appointed officer of a competent authority/ relevant person (see section “Access to the register” for the list of competent authorities/relevant person) or a designated person as outlined by Part 4 of the 2010 Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) Act to conduct customer due diligence tests.

Please email [email protected] with the following details:

• Name of the competent authority/relevant person you are acting on behalf of, or
• The name of the designated person you are acting on behalf of.

Please ensure you are:

• acting on behalf of a designated person as defined in Section 25, Part 4 of the 2010 Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) Act, or
• acting on behalf of a competent authority/relevant person.

On receipt of notification of a discrepancy report, a Discrepancy Notice Form will be provided by the Central Bank via secure means. Following receipt of the completed form via secure means, the discrepancy will be investigated by the Central Bank.