What is the final beneficiary? Who is a beneficiary: definition, features and rights

Beneficiary is the recipient of profit; this term can have several meanings depending on the field of activity.

If we are talking about an insurance case, then the beneficiary is the recipient of the compensation specified in the insurance policy. If the person specified in the agreement does not live to see the end of its validity period, then another person may become the beneficiary. In relation to property insurance, any owner becomes the owner if the property is insured in his favor by another person.

In inheritance law, the beneficiary is the heir under the will.

A beneficiary is also a person who receives income from his property, for example, by receiving rent when renting out a property.

The concept of a beneficiary also applies to the owners of shares who transferred them to trust management in order to obtain maximum profit. Beneficiary shareholders have the right to transfer ownership rights, resolve issues regarding the company's activities, have the right to vote at a meeting of shareholders, as well as to participate in the selection of the company's management.

In a trust, the beneficiary is the person who receives financial benefit from the management of the trust property.

The term beneficiary is widely used in offshore business. In this case, this is the real owner of the business, who is also called the “ultimate beneficiary.” This is usually different from the nominal owner, who is indicated in constituent documents. That is, de facto, the beneficiary is the owner of the business with all management rights and receives income from the company’s activities, but de jure the ownership right is assigned to other persons. The presence of nominee management is justified by maintaining confidentiality in relation to the final beneficiary.

Beneficiaries in banking activities

In banking, the concept of beneficiary is used in transactions with bank letters of credit, collection, guarantees and certificates.

When issuing a bank letter of credit, the beneficiary is the person in whose name it is opened, the owner of the documentary letter of credit.

As part of a collection banking transaction, the beneficiary is the recipient of the money after conducting banking transactions that confirm the buyer's receipt of the property as part of the transaction.

In relation to a bank certificate, the beneficiary is the recipient Money on it upon expiration of its validity period. Since the certificates are unnamed, this is not necessarily the person who opened the bank certificate.

The beneficiary of the bank guarantee is the creditor, who must receive funds under the agreement.

Market relations are developing, new economic entities are emerging. And many ordinary people do not understand what the word BENEFICIARY means. Let's try to figure it out. This concept has several definitions. And if you plan to engage in foreign trade activities, you definitely need to understand the whole variety of new concepts.

Beneficiary

A legal entity and an individual are allowed to be a beneficiary. Their income is generated by performing specific transactions. They are also the beneficiaries of transactions that are carried out with their property when managed on a trust basis. Interested parties, as they are also called, can hold bills of exchange and bank letters of credit.

What is a beneficiary? If foreign trade activities are carried out, it is a company that acts as a seller. If trust transactions are conducted, it is the person who benefits from the trust management of his property.

There is another definition that explains who the beneficiary is. You can become a beneficiary by inheritance if the one who was recorded in the insurance policy as a beneficiary died before the term of this agreement expired. Translated from French, this word is translated as profit.

Beneficial owner

According to Russian laws, the beneficial owner is the person who actually owns the entire company.

The beneficiary receives profit from the client's activities under an agency agreement or trust management.

The beneficial owner is individual. He is the owner of the company directly or through other persons. Can control all client activities.

These persons may not appear in the constituent documents, but they fully control the conduct of the business. By law, the beneficial owner has a share in the capital of a legal entity of twenty-five percent or more.

The ultimate beneficiary is an individual, the owner of the beneficiary organization. It was at the opening offshore companies hidden ultimate owners of profits appeared. Information about them is known only to the bank when opening an account and to the company’s agent. The ultimate beneficiary can dispose of the bank account.

Read also: Load factor of funds in circulation

Beneficiary and beneficiary

Are there any similarities and differences between a beneficiary and a beneficiary? Both have income from client actions. Difference. The ultimate owner has a stake in the company, a quarter or more. And he can control and manage the activities of this company. The beneficiary cannot do this. He doesn't even have his own share.

State control is exercised over the beneficiaries. There are certain conditions when the company is obliged to provide the necessary information about them. This is necessary in order to identify criminal acts and prevent them. Also this information helps prevent financial fraud.

Beneficiaries and information about them

We have already said why information about these individuals may be required. IN Lately Another point has been added, no less important than the above - the prevention of terrorist operations and the fight against terrorists.

Banking structures may also require the necessary information, and companies are required to provide it. And from banks this information goes to Rosfinmonitoring. Banks cannot avoid doing this, because otherwise they could be fined up to half a million rubles. This applies not only to banks, but to any financial institutions.

Some companies, in order to hide the data of the real owner, open an account in the name of a person who is only given the right to sign. The beneficiary in this case is under constant control. It turns out that it is easy to identify the beneficiary, but more difficult - the real owner.

The data of the real owners is requested, both financial and other. government agencies. For example, when public procurement contracts are concluded. The document “Information on the chain of owners, including beneficiaries” records all the data of the beneficiaries.

Rights and obligations

The rights of beneficiaries are protected by law. But they also have some obligations. The beneficiary can protect his property with a special trust management agreement. If the contract is violated, the ultimate owner and nominee are responsible for this.

The government's work to develop civilized market relations leads to the need to regulate more and more new areas, those that previously could be called a “wild market.” New rules are constantly emerging to regulate market relations and new economic entities are being legitimized. These include those persons who fall under the definition of beneficiaries.

Who are the beneficial owners?

The word beneficiary comes from the French word “benefice” (profit, benefit, income). A beneficiary is a person who receives income from the ownership of his property or funds under any agreement. At the same time, agreements that bring him material benefits can be of a different nature.

This person can be both an individual and a legal entity; in any case, this is the person to whom the cash payment is ultimately intended, or the recipient of benefits, income, profit, for example, from owning shares in a company that allow him to receive income from its activities.

However, the meaning of the term "beneficiary" may vary depending on the situation in which it is used. The following persons are considered beneficiaries:

• heirs indicated in wills for any property, taking ownership of it or receiving it for management;
• landlords who rent out their property (apartment, non-residential premises, car) and receive a regular payment for this, since they own the lease agreement;
• owners of bank accounts who manage and control them and receive profits;
• clients of the trust company who have handed over their property to trust management and receive income from it;
• owners of documentary;
• recipients of insurance payments under an insurance contract;
• owners of companies who receive income from their work.

Who are the final beneficiaries?

Ultimate beneficiary when owning a company, this is its real owner, to whom the profit flows ultimately flow. He can act directly, or maybe through ownership of other companies. Even if the company is legally owned by one person, the real rights of the owner may be completely different.

The following mechanisms can be used to establish beneficial ownership:

1. nominal agreement;
2. a declaration of trust defining the rights and obligations of the founders of the company and the owners of the entrusted property;
3. the deed of establishing a trust.

Most often, information about the ultimate beneficiary is confidential and not widely disclosed. To hide the ultimate beneficiary, offshore companies or nominee shareholders can be used.

Is the beneficiary a beneficiary?

To understand this, first of all, let’s find definitions for these concepts. Federal Law No. 115-FZ of 08/07/2001 allows this to be done.

Beneficiary is the person who benefits as a result of his client's actions. It is possible to receive benefits on the basis of various agreements:

• commissions;
• agency;
• trust management;
• sureties;
• conducting transactions with property or funds.

Beneficial owner is the person who ultimately directly or indirectly (through third parties) owns (has a predominant participation of more than 25% in the capital) of the company or has the ability to control the actions of this legal entity.

Simply put, this individual enjoys all the rights of the owner of the company, has income from it and, in fact, is its owner, although legally the ownership is registered in the name of another person.

The beneficial owner, without disclosing his identity, has the opportunity to:

Both concepts are close to each other and have many common features. For example, both the beneficiary and the beneficiary receive income from the work of their companies and organizations.

Legislation allows you to draw a line between them - the beneficial owner must be the owner of more than 25% of the capital and thereby participate in the management of the company - indirectly or personally.

This is the main difference between a beneficiary and a beneficial owner – ownership of a significant part of the profit.

Beneficiary control

It is this opportunity for beneficial owners to participate in the management of the company and control its actions that arouses interest among various inspection bodies. They may collect information about owners under certain circumstances to exclude:

• terrorist actions;
• financial fraud;
• criminal acts;
• legalization of illegal income, etc.

Beneficiary information

The beneficiary, who is the owner of the company, has the obligation to provide information about himself in response to requests from regulatory authorities, when concluding contracts and agreements with state-owned enterprises. The collection of such information is carried out to obtain the greatest transparency of the actions of the company itself and to identify its real owners.

Banks also require information about beneficiaries. Starting from 2013, company owners are required to provide such information about themselves. If banks allow such data to be concealed, this will entail a fine of up to 500 thousand rubles, so beneficiaries have to provide this information at the request of government organizations and banks.

If the beneficiary does not provide the credit institution with such information, then, most likely, the company will be refused cooperation - the reputation and guarantee of transparency of its activities will cost more.

If it turns out that the owner is only entitled to sign documents, that is, is only a nominal beneficiary, this will cause special suspicion. In this case, it will not be difficult to find the true owner of the company - for this, the chain of account holders is studied, which will lead to the real owner.

If a company signs contracts with government or credit organizations, it must provide information about the owners down to the final beneficiaries:

1. passport details;
2. the actual residential address of the beneficiary;
3. full beneficiary profile.

Without providing this information, the contract will not be concluded. Working with government organizations forces private companies to act completely transparently.

Protection of beneficiary rights

Russian legislation has given the beneficiary the right to go to court to protect their interests. Other beneficiaries or the management of his own company may violate his rights:

• by non-compliance with the terms of the contract concluded with him;
• when conducting illegal or unlicensed activities;
• when his rights to control in the company are reduced;
• by concealing by management the fact of infringement of its interests in the process of work;
• under other circumstances that prevent him from receiving income, according to the terms of the agreement.

The beneficiary can also provide himself with protection against the actions of nominee managers using a trust management agreement. Such an agreement makes it possible to terminate cooperation with the nominal management of the company if its rights are infringed. A well-drafted contract can oblige negligent managers to pay damages caused by their intentional or unprofessional actions.

Today, the strange word “beneficiary” can be used to refer to any person - the owner of real estate, money invested in assets and bank deposits, even the owner of an insurance policy. In business, the state closely monitors the ultimate owners of companies, especially expensive ones. Sometimes such owners turn out to be high-ranking officials who provide all kinds of “help” to the companies they created. Therefore, such control is, first of all, protective in nature and aimed at protecting the interests of all citizens.

Strict control of companies, aimed at identifying their ultimate owners, also occurs when they cooperate with government organizations. Sometimes beneficiaries are negatively disposed towards such measures, citing their right to protect confidential information. But in conditions when the growth of large corporations and the increase in their income requires transparent business conduct, each beneficiary makes a choice independently - to develop his business further or to keep secret information about which companies he owns.

Modern life introduces many foreign words into everyday use. One of these terms is often used in insurance, law and banking, although its general meaning is intuitively clear. We are talking about the word “beneficiary”. This concept is often found on the pages of special publications. Let's try to understand its meaning.

Basic definition

Wikipedia and various encyclopedic dictionaries give us the following definition of this concept: a beneficiary is a person who is the final recipient of a certain monetary payment. The basis for receiving funds is a debt document or agreement.

Origin of the concept

Presumably the word originates from French. The original word means benefit, monetary benefit, profit. In turn, the French word has Latin roots - the Latin bene translates as “benefit”. Thus, the beneficiary can be called a beneficiary.

Beneficiaries in real estate

This term has other meanings. For example, in civil law The beneficiary is the entity that benefits from the rental of real estate, in other words, a rentier. This can also be called people who have transferred the rights to manage their property to third parties. In this case, the final beneficiary is a person who receives income but does not participate in management. In the case of a business enterprise, this can be called the owner who has transferred the rights to the director or manager, and he himself simply receives income from the activities of the company.

Beneficiaries in insurance

In the insurance business there is the concept of "ultimate beneficiary". This is the person in whose favor the insurance payment will be made. In case of various unexpected events and illnesses, the beneficiary is usually the person whose health and property are insured. In case of accidents or sudden death the beneficiary is another person - usually close relatives or friends of the deceased.

Beneficiaries in banking

In some cases, the beneficiary is a depositor of a particular bank. This is how contracts refer to the holders of documentary letters of credit, persons specified as recipients of bank certificates, or those who receive collection payments.

Business area

In contracts governing economic activity enterprises, the beneficiaries of a legal entity are those who directly own the enterprise. This is usually a list of individuals who enjoy the rights of owners or proprietors of the company. The receipt and distribution of net income can be carried out both by the beneficiaries themselves and by intermediaries acting in their interests. In this case, the legal ownership of the company's assets may belong to a completely different person or even a competing company. Thus, paradoxical situations arise in the market when companies owned by one person are fiercely competing for sales markets.

Sometimes it happens that the beneficiaries are the founder or several founders who actually own the company, but do not manage it. Often, top managers are hired externally for this work and used in temporary, albeit very well-paid positions. In this case, the company manager assumes all the risks of the enterprise’s development, its success and expansion. If successful, temporary managers receive large profits; if they fail, they receive an indelible stain on their professional reputation.

The ultimate beneficiary is a person whose personal data is available only to the financial institution whose services the company uses. That is why the true ownership of many business enterprises can be so difficult to prove. In any case, the beneficiary is an individual. It cannot be any organization or voluntary society.

Owners of securities are often beneficiaries. The right to own someone else's assets belongs directly to him. As the owner of securities, the beneficiary has the right to participate and vote in meetings of the joint-stock company and to elect the management of the company. As a security holder, he takes part in various areas of the activities of his own company.

Publicity of the beneficiary

In many countries, the names of the real owners of businesses, companies and large trusts can be found from public registers posted on government websites. This is how the public controls the owners of continental corporations themselves, not allowing them to enter into oligarchic unions. On the other hand, there are many legal tricks that allow you to enjoy income in conditions of anonymity. In so-called offshore countries, special local laws have even been developed that allow owners of large capital to use their money while remaining unknown.

Hello! In this article we will talk about the beneficiaries.

Today you will learn:

• Who is the beneficiary;
• How is he different from a beneficiary?
• Who is the beneficial owner;
• How to protect the rights of a beneficiary.

Who is the beneficiary

Beneficiary is a borrowed word, and to unravel its essence, you need to turn to its French roots. Translated from French, this word means “profit” or “benefit”. Therefore, the simplest definition of a beneficiary is the person who receives the profit.

Speaking in financial language, the beneficiary is the person who owns the profit-generating assets. But we should immediately make a reservation that these are not only those individuals who actually own all the property of a particular company. In fact, the beneficiaries are everyone who can control (change) the activities of the organization.

That is, a beneficiary is a person who has the right to dispose of the organization’s property, regardless of whether it belongs directly to him or not. That is, these are individuals or legal entities who de facto own the funds, and therefore the company itself.

The concept of beneficial owner

The definition that the legislation attributes to the beneficial owner is written in Federal Law No. 115-FZ “On combating money laundering and the financing of terrorism.” It states that a beneficial owner is a person who directly or indirectly has a stake in a legal entity (25% or more) and can control the activities of that entity.

That is beneficial owner - the individual who directly or indirectly manages the activities of the company. Almost all management decisions lie on his shoulders, as well as those that can completely influence economic activity companies. Essentially, this is the person who has real power in the company and controls it.

The same regulation contains a definition of a beneficiary as a person for whose benefit the company's operations are carried out. Including according to agency, surety and other agreements.

Therefore, the full beneficiaries may be:

• Heirs and other persons who acquire benefits after the death of the recipient of any payments from a legal entity;
• Landlords;
• Persons holding bank accounts;
• Clients transferring property or funds into trust management;
• Beneficiaries under insurance contracts;
• Real company owners.

Some people, to completely ensure their own safety and lack of attention from others government agencies, try to hide information about the real benefits and owners of organizations. Most often, the actual owners of legal entities hide all information about themselves.

To avoid confusion, you need to immediately distinguish between two concepts: beneficial owner and beneficiary. The first has a direct or indirect opportunity to influence the activities of the organization, manage it and generate income. The second, is the usual beneficiary, receives profit from the activities of the organization or any other assets. Government authorities are only interested in information about the beneficial owners of a company, and not about its beneficiaries.

Rights and obligations of the beneficiary

According to the law, the beneficiary has a number of rights that protect his activities. But state protection only works if a person is state registered as a beneficiary of a particular company, which happens quite rarely.

However, the list of beneficiary rights includes:

• Disposal of shares in the company. The beneficiary has the right to fully or partially sell part of the company to other shareholders or third parties independently, without the consent of the remaining members of the board of directors or other supreme body management;
• Appoint, control and dismiss the general director of the company legally;
• Participate in the board of directors of the company and vote in decision-making according to the share in the company;
• Receive income in accordance with the percentage of shares (other shares) of the company.

The most important right of the beneficiary is the appointment and control over the activities of the general director of the company. The beneficiary has the right to appoint a nominee owner who will legally represent his interests within the company, and in case of a conflict of interests, also independently legally remove him from office.

But in addition to rights, the beneficiary also has a number of responsibilities:

• Register with government agencies;
• Provide all information about himself and the company of which he is a beneficiary;
• Pay taxes as a beneficiary of the company.

But, as you can guess, these rights and responsibilities are often neglected by the actual beneficiaries of various companies. It is more important for them to remain in the shadows so that government agencies cannot recognize who receives the company’s funds and how they get them.

Through nominal owners - general directors companies, the beneficiaries carry out their activities within the company, making all management decisions, but in the event of a conflict of interest, all disagreements are resolved in accordance with the agreement, thanks to which, with proper legal registration, it is possible to force a person not only to resign from his position, but also to pay full compensation to the affected beneficiary.

Protection of beneficiary rights

According to Russian legislation, a beneficiary can go to court if his interests have been violated by other beneficiaries of the company, or by its management.

The court will consider the petition in the following cases:

• If the terms of the agreement between the company and the beneficiary were not met;
• If the company conducts illegal or unlicensed activities;
• If the rights of a beneficiary within the company were illegally reduced;
• If the company deliberately concealed facts of infringement of the interests of the beneficiary;
• In other similar cases.

At the same time, the beneficiary can legally protect himself from the activities of nominee managers with the help of a trust management agreement that was concluded with these persons.

Most nominee managers have much less power than the beneficial owner, and he can terminate the contract with them at any time, which will entail their dismissal, or deprivation of their position, and, accordingly, of all nominal power within the company.

Thus, the beneficiary can pre-trially take advantage of the documentary support of his position and oblige the nominal managers not only to resign from their position, but also to compensate for all damage received by the beneficiary. But it is worth remembering that only a well-drafted agreement can serve as a guarantor of respect for the rights of the real beneficiary and owner of the company in disputes with the nominal manager.

Beneficial owner of a legal entity

Beneficial owner of a legal entity – a person or group of persons who have a direct or indirect impact on the activities of the company.

The beneficial owner of a legal entity is the person whose voice influences the activities of the organization. He can participate in the meeting of shareholders, directly influence the policies of the legal entity, make a decision on changing the form of ownership of the legal entity and, in general, any management decision.

Disclosure of information about the beneficial owners of a legal entity is most often not permitted. Quite often, in documents submitted for registration, as well as in the charter of legal entities, the actual activities of such persons in the organization are deliberately downplayed. Who these people are and what position they occupy in the company is truly known only to the bank employees who manage their accounts, as well as to the commercial agents who carry out transactions on their behalf.

Information about the beneficial owners of legal entities is hidden in the following cases:

• When doing business in offshore zones;
• In order to improve the taxation of individuals and the legal entity as a whole;
• When laundering funds obtained by criminal means.

In order to hide the identity of the beneficial owner and protect him from unnecessary attention of government authorities, trusts and other funds that manage securities, fictitious executive directors, bearer shares that allow the beneficial owner to participate in the activities of the company, etc. can be used.

Ultimate beneficiary

Now we have come to the end of the chain of beneficiaries.

Ultimate beneficiary – the individual who receives real profit from the company’s activities.

And if a company can have countless ordinary beneficiaries - beneficiaries, from trading partners to ordinary shareholders, then there is only one final beneficiary, and rarely there can be several of them.

In essence, the final beneficiary is the person through whom the company carries out its activities. And this person receives the lion's share of the enterprise's profits, while remaining in the shadows. This is beneficial for those who carry out shady activities, laundering income through offshore companies, as well as people whose attention to their person from government agencies is completely unprofitable.

In connection with the effect of Federal Law 115-FZ on the territory of Russia, banks are actively looking at the final beneficiaries, preventing them from laundering money obtained by criminal means. But despite all the measures, most of funds received by the final beneficiaries, who do not appear in any way in the company’s documents, go through more than one stage of “laundering” and end up in the account of the real beneficiary.

Disclosure of information about ultimate beneficiaries

Who may need information about the ultimate beneficiaries?

First of all, these will be government bodies that, within the framework of 115-FZ, will combat money laundering, terrorist financing and the illegal withdrawal of funds abroad.

This information may also be required for credit institutions. By identifying the final beneficiary, the bank can assess the risks of working with the company, its solvency and reputation, and based on all the data received, a decision is made to issue a loan.

All companies wishing to receive a loan or even just open an account are required to provide all information about the final beneficiaries to credit institutions. In this case, you need to fill out standard sample documents in the organization.

Credit institutions also provide information about final beneficiaries to Rosfinmonitoring. If a credit institution does not comply with these requirements, it will be subject to sanctions, including revocation of its license.

Also, in rare cases, government agencies themselves may request information about the beneficiary. In addition to actions within the framework of 115-FZ, this information serves as an additional guarantee of the partner’s honesty when concluding government contracts. When information for such contracts is submitted to the authorized body, a document is drawn up - “Information on the chain of owners”. It contains all the details of the company, as well as a complete list of all the founders and beneficiaries of the company, down to the final ones.

Partner companies may also need information about the final beneficiaries. To insure yourself against involvement in shadow financial schemes, and, accordingly, closer attention from government agencies and prosecution, you need to find out about the final beneficiaries of your partners before concluding contracts with them.

Bank guarantee: beneficiary and principal

In lending, the term beneficiary is used in the area of ​​issuing a bank guarantee. There are two persons involved - the beneficiary and the principal. They are opposites: the beneficiary is the creditor, that is, the beneficiary, and the principal is the borrower. For failure to fulfill obligations on the part of the principal, the obligations are assumed by a third party - the principal's guarantor bank.

That is, a contract is concluded between the principals and the beneficiary to provide a loan to the principal. He turns to his bank with a request to issue him a guarantee regarding the loan issued. And if the credit institution decides to satisfy this request, then this bank assumes the obligation to repay the debt and interest of its client if he is unable to pay this amount.

At the same time, there is also a four-party form of transaction, in which the principal’s bank provides its guarantee to the beneficiary’s credit organization, which, in turn, provides its client with a guarantee on its own behalf.

The presence of an intermediary increases the cost of the guarantee, but at the same time increases the reliability of the entire transaction, because now there are two banks that have direct or indirect obligations to the beneficiary. Thanks to this, the risk of non-payment is reduced to a minimum.

The bank guarantee is for:

• Guaranteed fulfillment of obligations;
• Making payments in specific situations;
• Execution of work under government and commercial contracts;
• Movement of goods through customs.

But despite the fact that nominally the guarantee is a bank guarantee, in the territory Russian Federation, at the request of the principal, both a legal entity and an insurance company can act as a Guarantor. The legal entity undertakes to pay off the debts of the principal in the event of failure to pay the principal and interest to the beneficiary.

According to Russian legislation, the issuance of guarantees is included in the list of banking operations. But world practice suggests that narrowing the range of legal entities that provide guarantee services may reduce the popularity of this instrument as a means of ensuring loan repayment.

Due to this, transactions for which this tool will be used as a way to diversify risks will drop significantly, which can lead to an increase in fraud on the part of both banks and legal entities-principals.

But at the same time, if an insurance company performs a service from the list of banking services, then by law it is subject to penalties or complete revocation of its license. And this is despite the fact that the whole essence of insurance companies involves carrying out such operations. After all, it is the insurers who must reduce the risks of non-payment by issuing guarantees (insurance) and subsequent payments if the principal does not pay the money (an insured event occurs).

In such conditions, banks act as a kind of monopoly on the provision of bank guarantee services. The benefit of the guarantor bank can range from 2 to 10% of the amount that will have to be paid if the client does not fulfill his obligations. In this case, all expenses fall on the principal’s side, because he needs additional security in order to receive a loan or ensure his obligations to the beneficiary.

That is, the beneficiary in the usual sense of the word, in a bank guarantee, is the guarantor himself, because it is he who receives the profit from the conclusion of the guarantee agreement. The beneficiary can also be called the creditor, who receives an additional guarantee of the return of funds - that is, additional profit.

Organizations without beneficiaries

There are organizations that by their nature cannot have beneficiaries. These are any non-profit and charitable organizations whose purpose is not to make a profit. They may not have beneficiaries, because there is no receipt of profit in their charter, and, accordingly, there may not be persons who receive it either.

But any commercial organization sets itself the primary task of making a profit. And when there is profit, then there are those persons who receive it - that is, beneficiaries. But despite such wide legislative framework, as well as the powers of government organizations and banking structures, quite often it is not possible to reliably determine the real ultimate beneficiary of some companies.

Shadow schemes make it possible to keep the identity of the final beneficiaries secret, hiding them from unnecessary attention of the tax authorities, and allowing them to withdraw money earned from crime abroad and launder it there.

A statistical fact confirming this information is that Cyprus issued about $60 billion to Russian companies in the form of almost interest-free loans in 2014, which is almost 3 times the level of its GDP. This only means that the volumes of funds exported from the country and resources laundered abroad are still enormous.

Under the law, a beneficiary is an individual or legal entity who directly or indirectly receives profit from the activities of the company. The beneficiary of a legal entity (ultimate beneficiary) is an individual who manages 25 percent or more of the company and has the ability to influence the activities of the organization.

State and banking authorities are interested in identifying the final beneficiaries in order to combat the legalization of proceeds from crime or the financing of terrorism within the framework of 115-FZ. Banks are interested in the final beneficiaries in order to assess the reliability of the company and predict the likelihood of it fulfilling its obligations.

In the language of a bank guarantee, the beneficiary is the creditor who issues funds from the principal and receives a guarantee of the fulfillment of his obligations from the guarantor bank. At the same time, the real beneficiary, in the official meaning outside the language of bank guarantees, is the guarantor bank, because it is he who receives the main benefit from the transaction, acting as a guarantor in these relations.