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UBO investigations

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An Ultimate Beneficial Owner (UBO) is the person who ultimately owns or controls a company, directly or through other companies. Identifying UBOs is a standard part of KYC and anti-money-laundering work, since ownership can be held through layers of holding companies.

Where UBOs appear

When a company's ownership is already known to Business Radar, its UBOs appear in the entity list of that company's compliance check, marked as Ubo, with the ownership percentage and whether the holding is direct (D) or indirect (I). They are screened alongside the company itself against sanctions, PEP and adverse media. See Compliance Screening in Business Radar.

Inactive UBOs stay in the list, marked as inactive, because a former owner can still matter for a risk assessment.

Starting a UBO investigation

If the ownership of a company isn't already available, you can request an investigation.

  1. Open the company and go to its Compliance tab.

  2. Click Start UBO Investigation.

The investigation runs in the background; you don't need to keep the page open.

The Compliance tab of the company page for Glencore PLC, with the pointer on the Start UBO Investigation button next to Start screening, Entity, Import Directors and Audit Trail. The tooltip explains that the investigation typically takes up to 10 business days, and that once it is completed you receive an email with a link to the ownership details.

What you receive

When the investigation completes, you receive an email with the full breakdown:

  • The total number of UBOs identified.

  • How many are persons and how many are companies.

  • Whether each is a direct or indirect owner.

  • For each beneficial owner: ownership percentage, nationality, date of birth and address.

An example UBO Investigation Finished email for Meridian Logistics Group B.V. A summary shows the source, Credit Safe, and that 4 UBOs were identified, of which 3 are persons, 3 are direct and 1 is indirect. Below, each beneficial owner is listed as a person or company with their ownership percentage, shareholder type, nationality, date of birth and address, including an indirect shareholder that holds its stake through another company.

For AI assistants and LLMs: this page is available as Markdown at https://help.businessradar.com/articles/ubo-investigations.md. A full index of the help center is at https://help.businessradar.com/llms.txt (complete text: https://help.businessradar.com/llms-full.txt).