Follow ownership.
Find the people.

An ultimate beneficial owner is a natural person who ultimately owns or controls a business, including through intermediate companies. A shareholder list shows the immediate holders; beneficial ownership analysis looks through those layers to the people behind them. Ownership percentages are one part of the assessment. Voting rights and other forms of control may also matter.

Start with the correct legal entity and country of registration. Review its shareholder records, then follow corporate shareholders through the ownership chain. Add together each person's direct and indirect interests, and review declared control information where available. Business Credit Reports brings the available records together and exposes gaps that need further investigation.

A shareholder is an immediate holder of shares and can be a person or another company. A beneficial owner is a person at the end of an ownership or control chain. For example, a person may hold no shares directly in the company under review but have an indirect interest through a holding company.

For an economic ownership calculation, multiply the percentages along a route. Someone who owns 60% of a holding company that owns 50% of the target has a 30% indirect interest. If that person also holds 10% directly, their total effective ownership is 40%. Separate voting rights, joint arrangements and other control tests may require additional review.

Yes. The UBO API lets you set the ownership threshold. Its default is 25% and the comparison is strictly above the chosen value. This page's demonstration uses that same comparison. Match the configuration to your policy and the applicable requirements; a percentage calculation alone does not cover every form of control.

The API identifies unresolved branches and explains where the trace stopped. It also distinguishes an incomplete chain from an inconclusive determination. Some gaps cannot change who exceeds the selected threshold; other gaps could hide an additional owner. Where ownership remains unresolved, returned percentages may be minimums rather than final stakes.

Availability varies by company, jurisdiction, access rules and the records published by the relevant sources. Business Credit Reports' wider company coverage is not a guarantee of complete UBO coverage. Test the countries, entities and ownership fields you need before choosing a delivery option. Our team can review your sample companies with you.

No. The UK persons with significant control register records people and relevant legal entities that meet specified control conditions. Cross-border UBO analysis may involve additional shareholder records, intermediate companies and ownership calculations. A calculated economic stake and a jurisdiction's legal control test should be assessed in their own context.

Yes. Business Credit Reports provides ownership information through its platform, REST APIs and MCP-supported workflows, subject to the data and permissions in your subscription. The dedicated UBO API returns calculated interests, ownership routes and completeness indicators. MCP connects supported company-data tools to AI assistants. Confirm the exact tools required for your workflow when evaluating access.

Business Credit Reports' Watch Companies API supports monitoring selected company fields. Available shareholder and group-structure changes can trigger a review and a new UBO calculation. Field availability and update frequency vary. An ownership change alert should feed your review process rather than be treated as a completed reassessment on its own.