Over 8,800 beneficial owners "self-declare" - The flow of applications to the Central Bank increases, more transparency
Around 9,000 applications were filed with the National Business Center during the past year in the register of beneficial owners, which is a legal obligation. Referring to official data from the NBC, specifically, a total of 8,821 applications were registered, a figure that is an increase compared to the previous year, where 7,952 applications were registered, helping to increase transparency and compliance with the legal framework.
In the last two years alone, this registry has had nearly 17,000 applications.
Albania adopted the law "On the Register of Beneficial Owners" in 2020, which became operational on February 1, 2021.
The registry is administered by the Central Bank of Kosovo and all entities and non-profit organizations are required to register their beneficial owners (including changes in beneficial ownership) within specific deadlines overseen by this institution.
Financial penalties for businesses that do not comply with the legal obligation to file data range from $500 for cases of non-compliance with deadlines, to up to $6,000 when authorities determine that they are doing so with the intention of hiding important data on the financial resources of their owners or shareholders.
The law on beneficial owners came as a recommendation from Moneyval, the European anti-money laundering structure, and aims to uncover the true owners, or shareholders, behind companies.
During 2022, when the law came into force, the number of applications filed with the National Business Center was several times higher, registering nearly 24,600.
The beneficial ownership data in the register are used by the competent authorities to varying degrees.
The National Business Center emphasizes that appropriate penalties have been applied for failure to comply with the obligation to submit beneficial owner information, which have had a corrective effect in the sense that the fined entities have later provided their beneficial owner information. Administrative sanctions have also been applied and cases where NBC data has been corrected based on Court Orders.
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