# VSB 20 Art. 27 — Establishing the identity of the beneficial owner - **Rubric (DE):** Feststellung des wirtschaftlich Berechtigten - **Rubric (EN):** Establishing the identity of the beneficial owner - **Chapter:** 4. Kapitel — Feststellung des wirtschaftlich Berechtigten an den Vermögenswerten (1. Abschnitt: Allgemeine Bestimmungen) - **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 The bank requires a declaration from the contracting party on who is the beneficial owner (*wirtschaftlich Berechtigter*) of the assets (Abs. 1). As a rule, natural persons are to be established as beneficial owners (Abs. 2). This applies to: opening accounts or passbooks; opening custody accounts; fiduciary transactions; accepting mandates to manage assets held with third parties; executing trades in securities, foreign exchange, precious metals and other commodities (subject to an exclusion set out in Bst. e); and cash transactions above CHF 15,000 (Abs. 3 Bst. a–f). Where a business relationship with a natural person is entered into by correspondence, the declaration on *Formular A* must be required in every case, except for the special cases named in Art. 18 (Abs. 4). The exemptions in Art. 29–36 are reserved (Abs. 5). ## Context & interpretation The SBA commentary states that Art. 27 sets the bank's general duty to establish the beneficial owner in all business relationships, subject to the cases regulated elsewhere as exemptions and special duties. It states that no beneficial owner need be established for safe-deposit box rentals, rent-deposit savings accounts and capital-payment accounts, and that for escrow accounts both seller and buyer are established. For cash transactions above CHF 15,000 a Formular A is still required despite the exemptions in the second section. ## FATF - [[FATF R.10 - Customer due diligence|FATF R.10]] — identification of the beneficial owner of the assets on a customer's declaration. ## Swiss counterparts - [[GwV-FINMA Art. 59 - Beneficial owner – principle|GwV-FINMA Art. 59]] — counterpart for GwV-FINMA Title 5 entities: written declaration of the beneficial owner, required there where the contracting party is not identical with the beneficial owner or this is in doubt (Abs. 1), whereas VSB Art. 27 Abs. 1 requires it generally. - [[GwG Art. 4 - Establishing the beneficial owner|GwG Art. 4]] — statutory basis for establishing the beneficial owner. ## Related VSB articles - [[VSB 20 Art. 18 - Minors and rent-deposit accounts|VSB 20 Art. 18]] — referred to in the article text - [[VSB 20 Art. 29 - Natural persons|VSB 20 Art. 29]] — referred to in the article text - [[VSB 20 Art. 30 - Operating entities not listed|VSB 20 Art. 30]] — referred to in the article text - [[VSB 20 Art. 31 - Listed companies|VSB 20 Art. 31]] — referred to in the article text - [[VSB 20 Art. 32 - Public authorities|VSB 20 Art. 32]] — referred to in the article text - [[VSB 20 Art. 33 - Banks and other financial intermediaries|VSB 20 Art. 33]] — referred to in the article text - [[VSB 20 Art. 34 - Simple partnerships|VSB 20 Art. 34]] — referred to in the article text - [[VSB 20 Art. 35 - Condominium and co-ownership communities|VSB 20 Art. 35]] — referred to in the article text - [[VSB 20 Art. 36 - Professional secrecy holders|VSB 20 Art. 36]] — referred to in the article text ## Part of - [[VSB 20]] ## Further AMLR connections - [[AMLR Art. 20 - CDD measures|AMLR Art. 20]] — VSB Art. 27 requires a declaration of who is beneficially entitled to the assets (natural persons as a rule), the Swiss concept closest to AMLR Art. 20(1)(h) (persons on whose behalf the customer acts); it does not itself require verifying their identity as AMLR Art. 20(1)(b), (h) do, and ownership/control of legal entities is covered separately by VSB Art. 20. See The Swiss beneficial-owner split. *(related)* ## Sources - VSB 20 (Vereinbarung vom 13. Juni 2018, in force 1.1.2020), Art. 27 - SBVg Kommentar zur VSB 20, Art. 27