# VSB 20 Art. 23 — Public authorities - **Rubric (DE):** Behörden - **Rubric (EN):** Public authorities - **Chapter:** 3. Kapitel — Feststellung des wirtschaftlich Berechtigten an operativ tätigen juristischen Personen und Personengesellschaften (2. Abschnitt: Ausnahmen von der Feststellungspflicht) - **Scope:** Banks & securities firms (incorporated via [[GwV-FINMA Art. 35 - Identification, controlling person and beneficial|GwV-FINMA Art. 35]]) - **Status:** In force (since 1 January 2020) ## Description Authorities (*Behörden*) do not have to give a declaration about the controlling persons (*Kontrollinhaber*). ## Context & interpretation The SBA commentary states that foreign authorities are also covered; whether a foreign body is an authority is determined by the foreign law concerned. Swiss authorities include those of the Confederation, the cantons and the communes, with their institutions and public-law corporations. Public-law corporations, institutions and foundations count as authorities if they have a statutory basis and perform public tasks. Look-through is never required, whether the authority is contracting party or controlling person. An authority named on *Formular K* does not conflict with the principle that only natural persons are established as controlling persons; the form counts as correctly completed. ## FATF - [[FATF R.10 - Customer due diligence|FATF R.10]] — related: this article limits the controlling-person declaration used to identify the beneficial owner of legal-person customers. ## Swiss counterparts - [[GwV-FINMA Art. 58 - Exemptions from establishing controlling persons|GwV-FINMA Art. 58]] — parallel exemption for authorities (lit. b) for GwV-FINMA Title 5 entities. - [[VSB 20 Art. 20 - Establishing the controlling persons|VSB 20 Art. 20]] — the declaration duty to which this exemption applies (Art. 20 Abs. 6 reserves Art. 22–26). ## Related VSB articles - [[VSB 20 Art. 32 - Public authorities|VSB 20 Art. 32]] — parallel exemption from the beneficial-owner declaration (Chapter 4) ## Part of - [[VSB 20]] ## Further AMLR connections - [[AMLR Art. 65 - Exceptions to obligations|AMLR Art. 65]] — Both relieve public bodies of BO information duties, at different levels: AMLR 65(b) lifts the entity's own Art. 63/64 duties for bodies governed by public law (Directive 2014/24/EU definition); VSB 20 Art. 23 only relieves a bank's customer that is a Behörde of the controlling-person declaration. *(related)* ## Sources - VSB 20 (Vereinbarung vom 13. Juni 2018, in force 1.1.2020), Art. 23 - SBVg Kommentar zur VSB 20 (2020), Art. 23