Beneficial Owner

The Beneficial Owner Answer is used to submit information about the ultimate beneficial owners (UBOs) of a company or legal entity, which is a critical component of ownership disclosure, transparency, and anti-money laundering compliance.

Hierarchical Structure Explanation

The Beneficial Owner model uses a hierarchical structure to represent ownership relationships. This is implemented using an LTree (Labeled Tree) structure in the database, where:

• Each entity in the ownership structure is assigned a path-like ID
• The top level entities start with a simple number (e.g., "1", "2", "3")
• Child entities have IDs that extend their parent's ID with a dot notation (e.g., "1.1", "1.2")
• Further descendants continue this pattern (e.g., "1.1.1", "1.2.1", "1.2.2")

This structure allows for representing complex, multi-level ownership hierarchies where companies can own other companies which in turn have individual or corporate owners.

Fields

Base Fields

Field	Type	Required	Description
fieldTypeId	string	Yes	Must be set to "BeneficialOwner" (from FieldTypeEnum)
beneficialOwnerAnswerItems	array	Yes	List of beneficial owner items

Beneficial Owner Item Fields

Field	Type	Required	Description
parentId	string	Yes	Hierarchical path ID using LTree notation (e.g., "1", "1.1", "1.1.1")
individualBeneficialOwnerAnswer	object	Conditional	Details of the individual beneficial owner (required if the UBO is an individual)
corporateBeneficialOwnerAnswer	object	Conditional	Details of the corporate beneficial owner (required if the UBO is a company)

Individual Beneficial Owner Fields

Field	Type	Required	Description
ownership	decimal	Yes	Percentage of ownership (0-100)
nationality	string	No	Nationality of the individual owner (ISO format)
documentNumber	string	No	Identification document number
documentExpiry	string	No	Expiry date of the identification document in ISO format (YYYY-MM-DD)
passportId	string	No	ID of the uploaded passport document (required if passport is provided)
idCardFrontId	string	No	ID of the uploaded ID card front document (required if ID card is provided)
idCardBackId	string	No	ID of the uploaded ID card back document (if applicable)
evidenceOfOwnerShipDocumentId	string	No	ID of the uploaded ownership evidence document
countryOfResidenceId	string	No	Country identifier for residence (ISO format)
countryOfBirthId	string	No	Country identifier for birth (ISO format)
userDetails	object	Yes	Personal details of the individual beneficial owner

Individual User Details Fields

Field	Type	Required	Description
firstName	string	Yes	First name of the individual
middleName	string	No	Middle name of the individual
lastName	string	Yes	Last name of the individual
dateOfBirth	string	No	Date of birth in ISO format (YYYY-MM-DD)
gender	string	No	Gender of the beneficial owner (Male/Female)

Corporate Beneficial Owner Fields

Field	Type	Required	Description
ownership	decimal	Yes	Percentage of ownership (0-100)
registeredName	string	Yes	Registered name of the corporate entity
company	object	Yes	Company details
address	object	No	Company address details
evidenceOfOwnerShipDocumentId	string	No	ID of the uploaded ownership evidence document
companyLicenseId	string	No	ID of the uploaded company license document

Corporate Company Details Fields

Field	Type	Required	Description
tradingName	string	Yes	Trading name of the company

Corporate Address Fields

Field	Type	Required	Description
streetAddress	string	No	Street address of the company
city	string	No	City name
countryCode	string	No	Country code (ISO format)
postalCode	string	No	Postal or ZIP code

Visual Representation of LTree Hierarchy

The LTree hierarchical structure can be visualized as follows:

Main Company LTD
│
├── 1 (Global Holdings Ltd - 76%)
│   │
│   ├── 1.1 (European Investments ... - 66.04%)
│   │   │
│   │   └── 1.1.1 (Jean Dupont - 100%)
│   │
│   └── 1.2 (Mohammed Ahmmed - 33.96%)
│
└── 2 (XYZ Ltd - 24%)

Example Using LTree Hierarchical Structure

Here's an example of an ownership structure with multiple branches:

{
    "fqName": "Beneficial Owner__Beneficial Owner",
    "answer": {
        "fieldTypeId": "BeneficialOwner",
        "beneficialOwnerAnswerItems": [
            {
                "parentId": "1",
                "corporateBeneficialOwnerAnswer": {
                    "ownership": 76,
                    "registeredName": "Global Holdings Ltd",
                    "company": {
                        "tradingName": null,
                        "companyTypeId": "BeneficialOwnerCompany"
                    },
                    "address": {
                        "streetAddress": "123 Corporate Plaza",
                        "city": "London",
                        "countryCode": "GB",
                        "postalCode": "EC1A 1BB"
                    },
                    "evidenceOfOwnerShipDocumentId": null,
                    "companyLicenseId": null
                }
            },
            {
                "parentId": "2",
                "corporateBeneficialOwnerAnswer": {
                    "ownership": 24,
                    "registeredName": "XYZ Ltd",
                    "company": {
                        "tradingName": null,
                        "companyTypeId": "BeneficialOwnerCompany"
                    },
                    "address": {
                        "streetAddress": "ADGM",
                        "city": "Abu Dhabi",
                        "countryCode": "AE",
                        "postalCode": null
                    },
                    "evidenceOfOwnerShipDocumentId": null,
                    "companyLicenseId": null
                }
            },
            {
                "parentId": "1.1",
                "corporateBeneficialOwnerAnswer": {
                    "ownership": 66.04,
                    "registeredName": "European Investments Ltd",
                    "company": {
                        "tradingName": null,
                        "companyTypeId": "BeneficialOwnerCompany"
                    },
                    "address": {
                        "streetAddress": "456 Business Avenue",
                        "city": "Paris",
                        "countryCode": "FR",
                        "postalCode": "75001"
                    },
                    "evidenceOfOwnerShipDocumentId": null,
                    "companyLicenseId": null
                }
            },
            {
                "parentId": "1.2",
                "individualBeneficialOwnerAnswer": {
                    "ownership": 33.96,
                    "nationality": "SA",
                    "countryOfResidenceId": "SA",
                    "countryOfBirthId": "FR",
                    "documentNumber": "010010101",
                    "documentExpiry": "2033-01-12",
                    "passportId": null,
                    "idCardFrontId": "1618d0aa-000e-4a14-a4bc-e1def4bbe383",
                    "idCardBackId": "1618d0aa-000e-4a14-a4bc-e1def4bbe383",
                    "evidenceOfOwnerShipDocumentId": null,
                    "userDetails": {
                        "firstName": "Muhammed",
                        "middleName": null,
                        "lastName": "Ahmmed",
                        "dateOfBirth": null,
                        "gender": null
                    }
                }
            },
            {
                "parentId": "1.1.1",
                "individualBeneficialOwnerAnswer": {
                    "ownership": 100,
                    "nationality": "FR",
                    "countryOfResidenceId": "FR",
                    "countryOfBirthId": "FR",
                    "documentNumber": "FR12345678",
                    "documentExpiry": "2030-06-15",
                    "passportId": null,
                    "idCardFrontId": "1618d0aa-000e-4a14-a4bc-e1def4bbe383",
                    "idCardBackId": "1618d0aa-000e-4a14-a4bc-e1def4bbe383",
                    "evidenceOfOwnerShipDocumentId": null,
                    "userDetails": {
                        "firstName": "Jean",
                        "middleName": null,
                        "lastName": "Dupont",
                        "dateOfBirth": null,
                        "gender": null
                    }
                }
            }
        ]
    }
}

This example represents the following ownership structure:

Implementation Guidelines

When implementing the Beneficial Owner Answer model, follow these guidelines:

Data Structure Rules

• Either individualBeneficialOwnerAnswer or corporateBeneficialOwnerAnswer must be provided for each beneficial owner item, but not both.
• The parentId must follow the LTree notation pattern (numeric values separated by dots).
• Each parentId must be unique within the submission.
• The total ownership percentage across all entities with the same parent should typically add up to 100%.

Creating the Ownership Structure

1. Identify all entities in the ownership chain that need to be represented
2. Assign parentId values following the LTree pattern:
   • Start with "1", "2", etc. for top-level owners
   • Use dots to indicate hierarchy ("1.1", "1.2", "2.1", etc.)
3. Submit complete information for each entity, including:
   • Appropriate documentation (passport, ID card, company license)
   • Ownership percentage (direct ownership of immediate parent)
   • Required personal or company details

Regulatory Considerations

• Beneficial ownership information is a key component of KYC (Know Your Customer) and AML (Anti-Money Laundering) compliance.
• All document IDs must reference documents previously uploaded using the Document Upload API.