3.1. Identification of Beneficial Owners

Effective from 7/6/2021

Under AML-CFT Decision, all registrars of legal persons in the UAE must comply with the following requirements:

	•	Registrars must provide the public with information on the types and features of companies they establish, the process for creating those companies, and the process by which members of the public can obtain information on those companies, including on the beneficial owner(s).
	•	Registrars must obtain and maintain certain basic information on each company they register, including its name, address, a list of directors, its legal form, and its founding statutes.
	•	Registrars must identify the beneficial owners of each company they register, defined as any individual owning or controlling at least 25 percent of the company.

In addition, all legal persons in the UAE are required to:

	•	Maintain accurate and up to date information on their shareholders and beneficial owners;
	•	Identify nominee shareholders and directors to their Registrar; and
	•	Appoint an individual resident in the UAE to be responsible for providing this information to the Registrar.

Cabinet Decision No. (58) of 2020 Regulating the Beneficial Owner Procedures further defined these requirements. All legal persons in the UAE must be licensed or registered, must identify their beneficial owners, and must hold accurate, up-to-date information on their beneficial owners in a Register of Beneficial Owners. They must also report the same information to the relevant registrar. The Resolution also requires that nominee directors identify themselves to the legal person for which they serve as director, and this information must also be included in the legal person’s Register.

There are certain limited exemptions to this requirement. For example, legal persons that are publicly traded on a stock exchange, or that are owned by such a company, do not have to identify or report their beneficial owners because of other transparency-related measures and obligations associated. In addition, if no individual meets the threshold by owning at least 25% of a legal person, that entity can report an individual who controls the entity (such as its managing director) instead of a true beneficial owner.

Together, these requirements aim to ensure that customers that are legal persons established and registered under the laws of the UAE must identify their beneficial owners and must always have up-to-date information on these individuals available. LFIs cannot rely solely on customers’ statements and must verify the identity of beneficial owners independently. But a UAE-based legal person customer that claims to be unfamiliar with the requirements, or represents that it has never been required to identify its beneficial owners, may not be in compliance with the law and should be treated as at least high risk.