The Belgian Presidency of the Council of the EU aims to reach a political agreement with the European Parliament on the revised Directive (‘AMLD 6’) and the strengthened Regulation (‘AMLR’) at the negotiation meetings on Tuesday 16 and Wednesday 17 January. According to a document dated Saturday 6 January that EUROPE was able to obtain, the Presidency is detailing the proposals for the package of measures relating to ‘landing zones’ that the Member States must examine (see EUROPE 13292/24, 13284/6).
“Reaching agreement on January 17 is the best way to allow for the adoption of the legislative texts in this legislature without recourse to the corrigendum procedure”, explains Belgium.
AMLR. Given that the Spanish Presidency was on the verge of a successful outcome at the meeting on 12 December, Belgium is proposing an incremental approach, building on what was done by its predecessor.
With regard to beneficial ownership, it suggests setting the standard threshold for identifying beneficial owners through ownership at 25% of shares or voting rights in order to avoid an excessive administrative burden. It also proposes to follow the methodology advocated by Parliament of calculating the threshold using an every-step-in-the-chain-method, which would have the advantage of bringing harmonisation to a highly fragmented area of calculation regimes.
In addition, the Belgian authorities wish to reject Parliament’s proposal to register foreign entities when they hold a stake in an EU public body. On the other hand, it proposes to accept the retrospective application of the registration requirement for foreign entities owning real estate in the EU, but to limit it to 1 January 2014.
The €10,000 threshold for cash transactions is a red line for the Presidency. In exchange, it proposes to accept the introduction of threshold-based reporting to financial intelligence units (FIUs).
The Spanish Presidency had proposed making football clubs obliged entities subject to obligations to combat money laundering and terrorist financing, with the possibility for Member States to exempt them in whole or in part. Belgium has put forward the idea of limiting these obligations to professional clubs, thus excluding agents and football associations.
Finally, for the very wealthy, Belgium suggests a risk-based approach. Credit and financial institutions would be required to take additional risk mitigation measures, subject to certain conditions.
AMLD. Article 10, on the powers of beneficial ownership registers, is one of the sticking points in the negotiations. The Presidency is proposing to show flexibility, by granting registries the power to carry out inspections on the premises of legal entities, although these inspections would be reserved for extreme cases. It also suggests a more flexible requirement than that sought by Parliament: that Member States provide registries with sufficient means to ensure that the information they hold is adequate, accurate and up-to-date, and to notify the European Commission of these means.
With regard to access to the register of beneficial owners on the basis of legitimate interest, Parliament’s proposal to include commercial database providers in the category of persons deemed to have a legitimate interest arouses scepticism on the part of the EU Council. It is also sceptical about the delays to approve access by the registers.
The Presidency proposes a transitional period at the start of application of the Regulation, during which a longer delay would apply to approve or refuse demands for access.
Finally, Chapter III, on FIUs, has been the subject of technical work in collaboration with Parliament and the Commission.
Read the document: https://aeur.eu/f/aci (Original version in French by Anne Damiani, with Mathieu Bion)