Ownership in banks in Montenegro should be completely transparent, and credit institutions legally obliged to show as ultimate owners natural persons who generate income from that ownership, announced the non-governmental organization Action for Social Justice (ASP).
In the ASP, they believe that their recommendation, given in the framework of the public hearing of the Ministry of Finance on amendments to the Law on Credit Institutions, would ensure greater transparency of ownership in the banking system, and therefore control of the origin of money.
They stated that there are currently examples in Montenegro where the ultimate owners are hidden behind companies registered in offshore zones or behind account custodians, but also the opposite – where the ultimate ownership is more or less transparent, i.e. known.
“Thus, in its data, Adriatic Bank shows the ownership behind a company registered in an offshore destination. It is a company Adriatic Capital LLC based in Delaware. “It was subsequently disclosed in the media that one of the owners of that company is a Canadian businessman of Russian origin, Alex Schneider,” ASP said.
They reminded that off shore zones enable easy hiding of real ownership and origin of money, frequent changes and transfer of ownership, but also a number of tax benefits, which is why they are labeled tax havens in economic circles.
“Furthermore, according to official records, the third, fourth and fifth largest shareholders of Prva banka are hidden behind account custodians, and in total they have about 11 percent of ownership, while at Hipotekarna banka, the single largest shareholder, with 34,4 percent of ownership, is hidden behind account custodians. “, they said from ASP.
They added that part of the banks show their ownership through foreign banking groups, where the capital of a state also appears as the ultimate owner, then through special companies, whose ultimate ownership is more or less possible to verify, and through listing individual natural persons as owners.
In the Montenegrin banking system, apart from domestic capital on a smaller scale, Eastern European, Western European and Turkish capital is present.
“It would be expedient to create some of the comparative legal examples in this area in the domestic legal system to show the ultimate natural persons who earn income from ownership in banks,” according to the ASP.
They said that, in this sense, the existing amendment to the Law on Credit Institutions, as one of the most important systemic laws in this area, is a good opportunity to improve the legal framework related to the transparency of ownership in banks.
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