The Bermuda Monetary Authority (BMA) has announced it is taking another step forward in its review and administrative procedures for company or partnership formations.Specifically, the BMA says there will be a refinement to the beneficial owner information companies must submit to the Authority as part of the formation process, and under exchange control requirements.Currently, all entities must submit to the BMA a personal declaration form on beneficial owners of the partnership or company who own five percent or more of voting interests or rights.“This filing has been in effect for several years and the Authority has managed this process on behalf of the Government,” said Jeremy Cox, CEO of the BMA. “The authorities in Bermuda have received further clarification on recent revisions to the international standard for identifying and disclosing information on beneficial owners, which has established the disclosure threshold at 10 percent or more of voting rights.”“Bermuda was already well ahead in moving toward adopting this standard, the most recent example being the Corporate Service Provider Act 2012 which took effect on 1st January 2013,” Mr Cox added.“We are now in a position to apply this standard across the board in Bermuda. This means that the disclosure threshold will change and entities will now be required to provide personal declaration forms for persons who own or control 10 percent or more of voting rights in a company or partnership, rather than the previous five percent level.”Mr Cox said that the new 10 percent threshold will also apply for companies that are subject to exchange control seeking approvals from the BMA to transfer securities.“Under the Exchange Control Act 1972 the BMA is in fact the Controller and has to date reviewed all persons who own five percent or more of securities in these entities when they request securities transfer permissions,” he said. “The threshold will now also change to 10 percent for such requests.”“For persons submitting securities transfer requests who own less than 10 percent of an entity, the BMA will still provide approvals under its current general permission policy. So basically there is no change in this context for those who do not meet the revised threshold,” Mr Cox stated.Mr Cox advised that the policy shift from five percent to 10 percent will take effect immediately both for company formation applications and exchange control permissions.