MOSCOW, June 15 (RAPSI) – Russia’s senators on Wednesday approved a bill obliging legal entities to disclose information about their beneficiaries to a number of federal authorities.

The document has been prepared in the framework of implementation of the national plan aimed at de-offshorization and better transparency of the country’s economy. Legal entities will be bound to receive, keep, and renew information on their beneficiary owners at least annually; the data should be documentarily registered and kept for at least five years.

At the same time, legal entities are to be granted the right to request information necessary to establish identity of beneficiaries from their founders and participants, including both legal persons and individuals. The said persons should be obliged to present such data; the respective transfers are not to be considered infringements on Russia’s privacy legislation.

Organizations are obliged to present such information on requests of a number of federal authorities, including tax agencies. The list of authorities vested with the power to request the respective information, as well as the terms and procedures governing the transfer should be determined by the Government. The Federal Financial Monitoring Service (Rosfinmonitoring) has been already put on this list.

According to the bill, a beneficiary owner is an individual owning more than 25 per cent of the total capital of a legal entity, or is able to control its operations.

Failing to comply with this obligation, legal entities and their executives may be fined under some amended articles of the Russia’s Code of Administrative Offences. The fines should make 30,000 to 50,000 rubles (about $500 to $800) for individuals and 100,000 to 500,000 rubles (about $1,500 to $7,500) for legal entities.

The bill conforms to the guidelines set by the Financial Action Task Force on Money Laundering (FATF).