What is S.A. (corporation)?
'''S.A''' or '''SA''' designates a type of limited company in certain countries, most of which have a Romance language as their official language and employ civil law. [[File:Banque de Montreux 1900.jpg|thumb|right|Share of the [[Banque de Montreux]], issued 20 November 1900. ''Société anonyme'' were common in Switzerland at this time.]] As with bearer bonds, anonymous unregistered share ownership and dividend collection enabled money laundering, tax evasion, and concealed business transactions in general, so governments passed laws to audit the practice. Nowadays, shareholders of S.A.s are not anonymous, though shares can still be held by a holding company in order to obscure the beneficiary. ==Other websites== * [http://www.globalwitness.org/campaigns/corruption/anonymous-companies Anonymous Companies] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150403003640/http://www.globalwitness.org/campaigns/corruption/anonymous-companies |date=2015-04-03 }} on [[Global Witness]] [[Category:Companies]] {{europe-stub}}