The Counsel of State suspended the adoption of its opinion on the draft decree of the Ministry of Economy and Finance setting up and governing the functioning of the Italian register of ultimate beneficial owners causing a further delay in its establishment.

Following the implementation of 4AMLD and 5AMLD in Italy at a primary level of legislation, the Italian Ministry of Economy and Finance (“MEF”) was to adopt a dedicated decree to set-up and govern the functioning of the Italian register of ultimate beneficial owners (“UBO Register”).

On December 2019, MEF published a draft decree under consultation which ended on early 2020 (“Draft Decree”) (please see our previous newsflash here). According to the Draft Decree, the deadline for the first reporting to the UBO Register was set at 15 March 2021. While such deadline was approaching, steps have been taken by MEF for the adoption of the final version of the Draft Decree, including obtaining the favourable opinion of the Italian Data Protection Authority on 14 January 2021 (available here in Italian only).

The MEF also submitted the Draft Decree, together with its technical annex and the favourable opinion of the Italian Data Protection Authority, to the Council of State in order for the latter to provide its opinion. The Council of State pointed out certain procedural and legislative shortcomings and invited the MEF to explain the reasons underlying several choices made under the Draft Decree. The Council of State also highlighted some lack of clarity that could potentially give rise to interpretative as well as practical uncertainties.

In addition, under the Draft Decree submitted to the Council of State, the deadline for the first reporting seems to have been postponed (from 15 March 2021) to 30 April 2021. Nevertheless, such deadline was deemed unrealistic by the Council of State, also considering the time needed to develop the necessary technical rules.

In light of the above, the Council of State on 19 March 2021 suspended the adoption of its opinion until the MEF provides certain information and clarifications. Therefore, although more than one year has passed since the end of the public consultation, the UBO Register is still to become effective.