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Beneficial owners (reelle ejere)

Beneficial owners (reelle ejere) are the natural persons who ultimately own or control a company — as a starting point, persons with more than 25% of the shares or voting rights, directly or indirectly through other companies.

The concept comes from anti-money-laundering rules: it must always be possible to identify the people actually behind a company, regardless of how many corporate layers sit in between. If no person holds more than 25%, the management is registered as beneficial owners.

Beneficial vs. legal owners

Legal owners are the direct, registered owners — which can be companies. Beneficial owners are always natural persons, found by following the ownership chain to the top. If Person A owns the holding company H ApS, which owns D ApS, then H ApS is the legal owner of D ApS, while Person A is the beneficial owner of both.

Access to registered beneficial owners is restricted
Since September 2025, the registered beneficial owners in CVR have been shielded from the public due to EU rules. Ownership can however still be computed from the public legal ownership stakes — the method companydata.dk uses.
Find the owners behind any company

Related terms

Legal owners (legale ejere)

Legal owners (legale ejere) are the direct owners of a company holding at least 5% of the share capital or voting rights. Legal owners can be both natural persons and other companies, and stakes are registered in intervals (5-10%, 10-15%, etc.).

Holding company (holdingselskab)

A holding company (holdingselskab) is a company (typically an ApS or A/S) whose primary purpose is to own shares in other companies rather than run its own operations. The structure is used to separate risk and defer tax.

Due diligence

Due diligence is the systematic investigation of a company ahead of a decision carrying significant risk — an acquisition, an investment, a credit engagement, or a strategic partnership.