Further to the decision of the Luxembourg Business Register (the “LBR”) to temporarily suspend the public access to its beneficial owner register (the “RBO”) following the judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union dated 22 November 2022 (the “Judgment”) (for more information, please refer to our previous article), the LBR has restored a more restricted access to the RBO and released on 19 December 2022 the Circular LBR 22/01 on the reopening of the RBO and its specific access procedure.

From now on, only professionals as referred to under article 2 of the law of 12 November 2004 on the fight against money laundering and terrorist financing (the “2004 Law”) as well as the internal user(s) the professional has designated (the “Users”) may consult the RBO.

Therefore, in order for professionals to access the RBO, they must first (i) enter with the LBR into a permanent agreement governing the terms and conditions of access to the RBO consultation (the “Agreement”) and (ii) complete a technical appendix (the “Appendix”).

Based on article 2 of the Agreement, the professional declares either that he/she has the right to (a) access the RBO for consultation, allowing the professional to (i) search in the RBO by registered entity, (ii) consult the data relating to the registered beneficial owners and (iii) order a RBO excerpt; and /or (b) access the information relating to the beneficial owners referred to in article 15 (1) of the law of 13 January 2019 establishing the RBO, as amended from time to time (the “2019 Law”), in which case the professional may (i) consult the RBO by registered entity and (ii) consult restricted information on the registered beneficial owners in accordance with article 15 (1) of the 2019 Law by way of excerpt. It should be noted that the latter declaration is only reserved to credit and financial institutions, court bailiffs and notaries acting in their capacity as public officers.

The professional must also fill the Appendix where he/she inter alia inserts his/her data and must tick the relevant professional category in accordance with article 2 of the 2004 Law.

Upon validation of this Agreement and its Appendix, a specific account will be created for the professional and the User(s), allowing the LBR to verify the identity of such professional and Users when they wish to consult the RBO.

For the creation of such specific account, the professional, including the User(s), must:

• Use a Luxtrust certificate; and
• Consult the RBO only as part of his/her anti-money laundering and terrorist financing obligation.

Indeed, the Agreement stipulates that the RBO shall only be consulted within the above-mentioned framework, under penalty of suspension of the professional’s access to the RBO.

For further information regarding the access to the RBO, Agreement templates and the Appendix, please click on the following link: Registre des Bénéficiaires Effectifs (lbr.lu).

For more information or if you have any question, feel free to reach out to our Corporate and Investment funds team.