Beneficial Ownership Transparency After Sovim: Between Privacy Rights and Anti-Money Laundering Imperatives in EU Law

Beneficial ownership transparency lies at the intersection of two fundamental values in EU law: the collective interest in financial transparency and the individual right to personal data protection. This article examines how EU anti-money laundering law addresses this tension following the Court of Justice of the European Union judgment in WM and Sovim SA v Luxembourg Business Registers (Joined Cases C-37/20 and C-601/20, 2022), which invalidated the unlimited public access model established by AMLD5. The analysis combines doctrinal examination of CJEU case law, normative analysis of AMLD6 and AMLR, and comparative analysis of implementation practices across fourteen Member States. The study shows that Sovim did not reject differentiated access to beneficial ownership information; it rejected the complete elimination of access distinctions. It further demonstrates that AMLD6 introduces a hybrid model combining presumed legitimate interest for journalists and civil society organisations with individualised assessment for other applicants, and that Member State practice produces fragmented access regimes. The article’s original contribution is twofold: first, it applies the rules versus standards framework from general legal theory to show that this hybrid model repositions, rather than resolves, the categorical and individualised tension identified in Sovim; second, it proposes a three-part test consisting of purpose nexus, subject matter proportionality, and institutional anchoring for the individualised branch of the AMLD6 legitimate interest criterion, which AMLD6 itself leaves unspecified. These findings are particularly relevant for Ukraine, whose beneficial ownership register historically corresponded to the fully public model invalidated by the Court and whose wartime experience of register access adds a further, distinct dimension to the harmonisation obligations for EU candidate states.