Public Limited Company: all are liable to make their accounts publicly available. Companies on the stock market are obliged to follow much tighter rules regarding information made to the public.

Private Limited Company: all private limited companies are liable to make their accounts publicly available.

Proprietorship: do not have to make their accounts publicly available.

Partnership: only the largest partnerships are required to make their accounts publicly available. They fulfill two out of three of the prerequisites:-

• their total assets are over 200 MI.ISK
• their operating revenue is over 400 MI.ISK
• the average number of employees is over 50

Co-Operative Societies: there are two types of society in Iceland, Samvinnufelag and Samlagsferag. Samvinnufelag is more of a general society while Samalagsfelag is usually agricultural. The general ones (Samvinnufelag) are always liable to make their accounts publicly available while the others operate under the same terms as the above requirements for partnerships (i.e. only the largest ones who fulfill two of the three above requirements must make their accounts publicly available).

Notes on Legal Forms

Einkafyrirtaeki: is a Proprietorship of an individual operated on his or hers full responsibility. They only need a VAT number and to register as a proprietorship with the tax authorities to start operation

Sameignarfelag: (abbreviated SF) is a Partnership established by at least two individuals who both are fully responsible for the liabilities of the company. Partnerships can be a taxable entity or the owners can in accordance with their share in the company each pay the taxes of the company.

Samvinnufelag: (abbreviated SYF) is a Co-operative Society that can be established to operate in a certain district of the company. Only one such society is in the same district , and owners are usually farmers or individuals trading with the society. There are Co-operative Societies operating in every corner of the country.

Samlagsferag: is a society usually owned by farmers or Co-operative Societies. In Iceland used mainly for production and marketing companies in the milk and meat industry.

Einkahlutafelag: (abbreviated EHF) is a Private Limited Liability company where the owner is only responsible up to the amount of stock he has put into the company. It is not possible to trade with stocks of Private Limited Liability Companies on the Official stock market as they do not issue stock securities.  The shares can be traded as other securities.

Hlutafelag: (abbreviated HF) is a Limited Liability Company or a Public Limited Liability Company. This type of company can go on the Official Stock Market.

Another form of company is an Official Institution (state guarantee), i.e. Non-profit Associations and Sports Clubs. There are also operating branches from foreign companies. Regarding the publicity of annual accounts of daughter-companies and branches of foreign companies, they are not liable to publicize their annual accounts if their mother company makes public their consolidated financial accounts. Some other forms of operation can be found following special law and will not be discussed here.

• the company's registration number
• the legal address
• the VAT number
• names and personal ID codes of company owners
• date of establishment
• names and addresses of board members
• names of those with legal power of procreation
• equity capital and company function

Direct telephone interview:

• activity/market territory
• client type & number
• premises/branches/divisions/employees
• affiliations
• principals' antecedents
• expansion plans
• balance sheets/profit & loss/projected sales

Financial Statement local database:

Our local distributor has a database of financial statements of all companies required to file accounts. However, it can take up to 12 months after the end of the financial year for the company to actually file their statement with the appropriate authority.

Detrimental local database:

Our local correspondent has a database which contains the following company specific data:

• unpaid debts
• forced sales
• bankruptcies - data from the official registry of companies
• attachments
• court-signed subpoenas
• court sentences

Should you require any further information or have any questions, please contact your local Customer Service Centre.

Business Information Report enquiries which are placed with D&B's Emerging Markets Centre should always contain the below details. Unfortunately, enquiries without the below information have a much higher chance of being returned as an Unable To Locate Report. This is simply due to the fact that data sources in the Emerging Markets are not as sophisticated as those in Western Europe.

• Full Company Name
• Full Head Quarters Address (street, town, country)
• Telephone Number
• Fax Number

Any additional information such as a contact name or line of business would also help to locate the subject of your enquiry.