For Whose Benefit? Reframing Beneficial Ownership Disclosure Around Users’ Needs

Abstract

BENEFICIAL OWNERSHIP DISCLOSURE – collecting and sharing information on genuine (rather than formal or nominee) owners of assets – is an area of financial crime policy that many countries struggle with. It can be highly emotive, as demonstrated by the public disagreement between the UK, the first state with a publicly accessible beneficial ownership register, and certain British Overseas Territories (BOTs), which favour only making beneficial ownership information available to state authorities. At the same time, even countries that pride themselves on their leadership in beneficial ownership disclosure face challenges in ensuring the efficacy of their frameworks. The UK is one of them, as are EU member states, which are bound by EU law to set up public registries. Amid disagreements about the value of transparency and technical discussions about data verification, the questions of how beneficial ownership information is in fact used and what this means for policymaking are all too often overlooked. This paper aims to address them by examining the needs and interests of various potential users of such information, including domestic and foreign law enforcement agencies, tax authorities, regulated businesses and the public at large. This analysis is based on a review of publicly available sources and over 40 interviews, including over 25 interviews with experts based in the BOTs and Crown Dependencies. Contrary to what current controversies might lead one to believe, there is broad scope for agreement. Public accessibility of beneficial ownership information is rarely, if ever, held out as an end in itself. What does matter, however, is understanding what the users of such information require, securing its accuracy and ensuring it does not acquire a totemic status which obscures other meaningful efforts against financial crime. Show more