Case C‑676/16

CORPORATE COMPANIES s.r.o.

v

Ministerstvo financí ČR

(Request for a preliminary ruling from the Nejvyšší správní soud)

(Reference for a preliminary ruling — Prevention of the use of the financial system for the purpose of money laundering and terrorist financing — Directive 2005/60/EC — Scope — Article 2(1), point 3(c) and Article 3, point 7(a) — Business activity of an undertaking consisting in the sale of companies already entered in the Register of Companies and formed solely for the purposes of sale — Sale by means of the transfer of the undertaking’s holding in the ready-made company)

Summary — Judgment of the Court (First Chamber), 17 January 2018

Approximation of laws — Prevention of the use of the financial system for the purpose of money laundering and terrorist financing — Directive 2005/60 — Scope — Undertaking whose business activity consists in selling ready-made companies — Included

(European Parliament and Council Directive 2005/60, Arts 2(1), point 3(c) and 3, point 7(a))

Article 2(1), point 3(c) of Directive 2005/60/EC of the European Parliament and of the Council of 26 October 2005 on the prevention of the use of the financial system for the purpose of money laundering and terrorist financing, read in conjunction with Article 3, point 7(a) of that directive, must be interpreted as meaning that a person, such as that at issue in the main proceedings, whose commercial activity consists in selling companies which it formed itself, without any prior request on the part of its potential clients, for the purposes of sale to those clients, by means of a transfer of its shares in the capital of the company being sold, falls within the scope of those provisions.

(see para. 34, operative part)