Companies, others warned to disclose true owners or be struck off the register
Published:Wednesday | June 25, 2025 | 12:09 AM
The Companies Office of Jamaica listed over 220 companies at risk of being struck off the register for failing to disclose their beneficial owners.
The companies have three months dating from May 23 to remedy the breach, COJ said, otherwise they will be dissolved.
The list contains corporations, social organisations, and churches.
A beneficial owner is an individual who ultimately owns or controls a company, holding more than 50 per cent of the voting rights or having the power to influence key decisions, either directly or through another person or entity. Companies Office said beneficial ownership disclosure improves transparency and accountability.
The beneficial ownership regime is seen as central to preventing the misuse of corporate structures for illicit purposes.
It became a requirement under law through amendments to the Companies Act in around 2017 and was further reinforced as part of Jamaica’s commitment to the global Financial Action Task Force to improve its anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing framework or AML-CTF for short.
Jamaica agreed to a 13-point action plan with the FATF in 2020 and, having delivered on them, the country was removed from the FATF’s grey list in June 2024.
Among the prominent corporate entities issued with warnings by the Companies Office is A. S. Bryden & Sons Holdings Limited, a regional distributor based in Trinidad & Tobago with deep roots across the Caribbean. The company was recently acquired by Jamaica’s Seprod Group.
“Lots of companies are on that list, as, in our case, probably a genuine oversight,” said Richard Pandohie, who is the CEO of both Seprod and Bryden.
He indicated that part of the issue relates to A. S. Bryden being a Trinidad entity getting registered in Jamaica, as the “responsible officers are based in Trinidad”, he added.
Also on the list is First Rock Real Estate Investments Limited, a player in the local real estate scene.
“First Rock Real Estate is required to file in St Lucia. Remember it is not a Jamaica entity,” Chairman of First Rock Group Ryan Reid said in response to the Financial Gleaner.
Efforts to obtain clarification from the Companies Office on why overseas-registered entities were on the list proved unsuccessful. Multiple calls placed to the agency’s listed numbers went unanswered, and no official comment was available at the time of publication.
The majority of entities listed by the COJ are commercial businesses spanning a wide range of industries, as well as financial and investment holding firms, and the region’s credit rating agency.
The scope also covers international consultancies, holding companies, and service providers.