S.A. (corporation)
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S.A. (corporation)
Société anonyme (and variants in other languages; English: Anonymous society; shortened to S.A. or SA) designates a type of corporation in countries that mostly employ civil law. Depending on language, it means anonymous company, anonymous partnership, share company, or joint-stock company, roughly equivalent to public limited company in common law jurisdictions. It is different from partnerships and private limited companies.
Originally, shareholders could be literally anonymous and collect dividends by surrendering coupons attached to their share certificates. Dividends were therefore paid to whoever held the certificate. Share certificates could be transferred privately, and therefore the management of the company would not necessarily know who owned its shares.
Like 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 holding companies in order to obscure the beneficiary.
In different countries
S.A. can be an abbreviation of:
Sociedade Anónima in Galician and European Portuguese (used in Portugal, Angola, Timor Leste, Macao, Mozambique, and other Portuguese-speaking countries)
Sociedá Anónima in Asturian and Leonese
Sociedade Anônima in Brazilian Portuguese (used in Brazil)
Societat Anònima in Catalan
Société anonyme (SA) in French (as used in French-speaking countries such as France (including French Polynesia, and New Caledonia) and Monaco; also in partially Francophone countries and/or nations with French as one of their official languages like Belgium, Luxembourg, Haiti, Switzerland, as well as Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Mauritania, Senegal, Ivory Coast, Algeria and other African countries)
Società Anonima in Italian (since 1942 Società per Azioni, S.p.A.)
Sociedad Anónima or Sociedad por Acciones in Spanish Mexican law also takes into account the variability of the corporate stock, resulting in most S.A. turning into Sociedad Anónima de Capital Variable (S.A. de C.V.), or Sociedad Anónima Bursátil de Capital Variable (S.A.B. de C.V.) for publicly traded companies. Mexico also has Sociedad de Responsabilidad Limitada de Capital Variable (S.R.L. de C.V.), which is analogous to the limited liability company.
Spółka Akcyjna in Polish
Societate pe Acțiuni in Romanian
It is equivalent in literal meaning and function to:
It is equivalent in function to:
Shoqëri Aksionare (Sh.a.) in Albanian
شركة مساهة عامة ذات مسؤولية محدودة ش.ذ.م.م, Sharikah musāhamah ʿāmmah dhāt mas'ūliyyah maḥdūdah (literally, "Public share company with limited liability") in Arabic
Dioničko društvo (d.d.) in Croatian and Bosnian
Акционерно дружество, Aktsionerno druzhestvo (АД) in Bulgarian
Акционерско друштво, Aktsionersko drushtvo (АД) in Macedonian
Akciová společnost (a.s.) in Czech
Aktieselskab (A/S) in Danish
Société anonyme égyptienne (S.A.E.) or (شركة مساهمة مصرية (ش.م.م (Sherka mosahama Maṣreyya) (literally, "Egyptian share company") in Egypt
Osakeyhtiö (Oy) in Finnish
Aktsiaselts (AS) in Estonian
Részvénytársaság (Rt) in Hungarian
Hlutafélag (Hf) in Icelandic
Public Limited (LTD.) in India
Public limited company (plc) in the United Kingdom, Ireland, and several Commonwealth countries
Kabushiki Gaisha (K.K.) or 株式会社 in Japan
Jusighoesa (J) or 주식회사 in Korea
Société anonyme laotienne (S.A.L.) in Laos
Akcinė bendrovė (AB) in Lithuanian
Akciju Sabiedrība (AS) in Latvian
Aksjeselskap (AS) in Norwegian
Акционерное общество, Aktsionernoye obshchestvo (AO) in Russian
Деоничарско друштво, Deoničarsko društvo (d.d.), or Акционарско друштво, Akcionarsko društvo (a.d.) in Serbian
Akciová spoločnosť (a.s.) in Slovak
Delniška družba (d.d.) in Slovene
Aktiebolag (AB) in Swedish
Акціонерне товариство, Aktsionerne tovarystvo (AT) in Ukrainian
Publicly traded company or Incorporated (Inc.) in the United States, though the former term does not appear in the names of business entities
Compañía Anónima (C.A.) in Andorra
ក.អ(ក្រុមហ៊ុនអនាមិក) or Société anonyme cambodgienne (S.A.C.) (literally, "Cambodian share company") in Cambodia