Corporate, Internet and Regulatory Law

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A PEP means a natural person who is or has been entrusted with prominent public functions and includes:

• Heads of state, heads of government, ministers and deputy or assistant ministers.
• Members of parliament or similar legislative bodies.
• Members of the governing bodies of political parties.
• Members of supreme courts, constitutional courts or other high-level judicial bodies whose decisions are not subject to further appeal, except in exceptional circumstances.
• Members of courts of auditors or the boards of central banks.
• Ambassadors, charges d’affaires and high-ranking officers in the armed forces.
• Members of the administrative, management or supervisory bodies of state-owned enterprises.
• Directors, deputy directors and members of the board or equivalent function of an international organisation (Article 3(9) of MLD4).

Article 11 - Member States must ensure that obliged entities apply customer due diligence measures in the following circumstances:

(b) when carrying out an occasional transaction that: (i) amounts to EUR 15,000 or more, whether that transaction is carried out in a single operation or in several operations which appear to be linked; or (ii) constitutes a transfer of funds, as defined Article 3(9) of Regulation (EU) 2015/847 exceeding EUR 1,000;

(c) in the case of persons trading in goods, when carrying out occasional transactions in cash amounting to EUR 10,000 or more, whether the transaction is carried out in a single operation or in several operations which appear to be linked;

(d) for providers of gambling services, upon the collection of winnings, the wagering of a stake, or both, when carrying out transactions amounting to EUR 2,000 or more, whether the transaction is carried out in a single operation or in several operations which appear to be linked.

Correspondent relationship means:

(a) the provision of banking services by one bank as the correspondent to another bank as the respondent, including providing a current or other liability account and related services, such as cash management, international funds transfers, cheque clearing, payable-through accounts and foreign exchange services;

(b) the relationships between and among credit institutions and financial institutions including where similar services are provided by a correspondent institution to a respondent institution, and including relationships established for securities transactions or funds transfers (Article 3(8)).

Article 3 (6) ‘beneficial owner’ means any natural person(s) who ultimately owns or controls the customer and/or the natural person(s) on whose behalf a transaction or activity is being conducted and includes at least:

(a) in the case of corporate entities:

(i) the natural person(s) who ultimately owns or controls a legal entity through direct or indirect ownership of a sufficient percentage of the shares or voting rights or ownership interest in that entity, including through bearer shareholdings, or through control via other means, other than a company listed on a regulated market that is subject to disclosure requirements consistent with Union law or subject to equivalent international standards which ensure adequate transparency of ownership information.

A shareholding of 25 % plus one share or an ownership interest of more than 25 % in the customer held by a natural person shall be an indication of direct ownership. A shareholding of 25 % plus one share or an ownership interest of more than 25 % in the customer held by a corporate entity, which is under the control of a natural person(s), or by multiple corporate entities, which are under the control of the same natural person(s), shall be an indication of indirect ownership. This applies without prejudice to the right of Member States to decide that a lower percentage may be an indication of ownership or control.

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

(ii) if, after having exhausted all possible means and provided there are no grounds for suspicion, no person under point (i) is identified, 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), the obliged entities shall keep records of the actions taken in order to identify the beneficial ownership under point (i) and this point.

Directive 2015/2366/EU on payment services (PSD2)

Custodian wallet providers means an entity that provides services to safeguard private cryptographic keys on behalf of its customers, to hold, store and transfer virtual currencies.

The new EU AML/CTF regime comprises the Fourth Money Laundering Directive (Directive 2015/849)(MLD4), the Wire Transfer Regulation (Regulation 2015/847 (WTR), and the Fifth Money Laundering (Directive 2018/843 (MLD5).MLD5 which amends MLD4 is available as a consolidated document on Europa.

The new EU AML/CTF regime comprises the Fourth Money Laundering Directive (Directive 2015/849)(MLD4), the Wire Transfer Regulation (Regulation 2015/847 (WTR), and the Fifth Money Laundering (Directive 2018/843 (MLD5).MLD5 which amends MLD4 is available as a consolidated document on Europa.

Fiat currencies are coins and banknotes that are designated as legal tender and electronic money, of a country, accepted as a medium of exchange in the issuing country, such as the Euro. The Commission refers to this type of provider as a virtual currency exchange platform (VCEP)”.

Virtual currencies means a digital representation of value that is not issued or guaranteed by a central bank or a public authority, is not necessarily attached to a legally established currency and does not possess a legal status of currency or money, but is accepted by natural or legal persons as a means of exchange and which can be transferred, stored and traded electronically.

Gambling: With the exception of casinos, and following an appropriate risk assessment, Member States may decide to exempt, in full or in part, providers of certain gambling services from national provisions transposing this Directive on the basis of the proven low risk posed by the nature and, where appropriate, the scale of operations of such services.