Skip to main content
This guide is outdated and will be removed on 1 November 2026. The up-to-date Malta reference is on the Malta country page.

Start here

This guide contains public integration notes for Malta. Use it for identifier formats, search behavior, and country-specific caveats. The live source of truth for coverage, pricing, data sources, documents, legal forms, roles, and status values is the pricing page.

Malta coverage, pricing, and sources

Open the current catalog for supported datapoints, documents, sources, identifiers, and availability.
Country details below are preserved as integration notes. If a table or example conflicts with the live pricing page, use the pricing page as the source of truth and contact support.
Verification mode only. Every Malta datapoint is served from the live register in verification mode. A request with "mode": "prefill" fails each Malta datapoint with fast_source_unavailable. Omit mode or pass "verification". See Modes.

Table of Contents

Data Sources

Malta uses a single official register for all company data. For a given entity, data comes from one source, with no cross-register merging.
  • Malta Business Registry (MBR), queried live through its online system, BAROS (Business Automation Registry Online System). The MBR keeps the register of companies and partnerships under the Companies Act (Cap. 386), and of foundations and associations under the Second Schedule to the Civil Code. It returns the company profile (name, registration number, legal form, status, registration date, registered office, issued share capital, area of activity), the persons recorded on the entity (directors, secretary, legal and judicial representatives, partners, liquidators, auditors, subscribers and other involvements), the share register used for shareholders, and the list of filed documents, which are sold per document.
A VAT number search is first resolved to the company’s registered name through the EU VAT validation service (VIES), then searched by that name in the MBR.
Authenticated source: The Maltese register requires authenticated access. Topograph handles this as part of the standard API flow.

Company Identifiers

Domestic private and public limited liability companies also return company.identifiers.euid, for example MTROC.C2833. The EUID omits the space in the national registration number. It is not a search key.

Query Identifiers

Malta Registration Number Format: Malta registration numbers consist of an entity-type prefix (C, P, P COMM, OC, SV, or LPF) followed by a space and digits (e.g., C 2833). The space between the prefix and the number is part of the official format. The one exception is the former offshore series, written with slashes and no space (e.g., OS/1116/NT).

Identifiers in API Response

Once you retrieve company data, the identifiers object contains all available identifiers for that entity: GLEIF is the supplementary data source for this identifier. company.identifiers.lei is optional. It is returned when the Maltese registration number (registrationNumber) matches exactly one LEI through a GLEIF registration or validation reference. The Legal Entity Identifier has 20 uppercase alphanumeric characters, ending in two check digits. Coverage varies by entity. An absent lei does not prove that the company has no LEI. Lapsed, retired or merged LEIs may be returned; annulled LEIs are excluded.

Search Capabilities

Search Performance: Identifier-based searches use exact matching and return the exact match first (matchReason.matchType = "id"); other results may follow. Name searches use partial matching and may return many results. A VAT number is resolved to its registered name through the EU VAT validation service, then searched by that name. All search types query the Malta Business Registry live.

Active companies only

Search can return companies that are no longer active, but search results carry no company status, so activeOnly=true has no effect. Check company.status on the company profile.

Quirks & Gotchas

Mappings

Company Status

status.localName preserves the register’s wording. Known statuses are mapped deterministically, without AI. status.active is true only for Active. The mapping covers observed profile statuses and the register’s explicit struck-off variants:
A status outside this mapping keeps its register wording, returns statusDetails.status: "UNKNOWN", and omits active. If the register supplies no status, company.status is absent.
legalForm.localName is the company type exactly as the register words it. The register records a limited liability company together with its category (private or public, exempt or non-exempt, single member), which is written in parentheses. So one legal form can appear under several local names: Limited Liability Company (Private Exempt) and Limited Liability Company (Private Non-Exempt) are both private limited liability companies. Compare companies on legalForm.standardized and legalForm.iso20275Code, not on localName. englishTranslation, standardized and iso20275Code come from a closed list of the 57 forms the Malta Business Registry registers; the full list is on the pricing page. A legacy form outside that list is translated and standardized at request time, and carries isAIEnriched: true.

Companies

Private vs Public: A private company may have a maximum of 50 shareholders, may not invite the public to subscribe for shares, and restricts share transfer rights. A public company has no such restrictions. Exempt vs Non-Exempt: An exempt company has fewer regulatory obligations (e.g., audit exemption eligibility under S.L. 386.20). Private and public companies have different minimum authorised share capital requirements under Maltese company law.

Partnerships, branches and other entities

A partnership en nom collectif (general partnership) has partners who are jointly and severally liable. A partnership en commandite (limited partnership) has at least one general partner (unlimited liability) and one limited partner (liability limited to contribution). Both are governed by the Companies Act 1995.
iso20275Code is returned where GLEIF publishes an ISO 20275 code for the form in Malta. Cells, SICAVs, overseas companies, international trading and holding companies, and the legacy offshore forms have none.

Roles

Roles are mapped from a closed list of the roles the Malta Business Registry records, published on the pricing page. role.localName is the register’s own wording; englishTranslation and standardized are fixed per role. A role is returned under legalRepresentatives when Maltese law gives it the representation of the entity, and under otherKeyPersons otherwise. A role can be held by an individual (type: "individual") or a company (type: "company").
Individuals carry the nationality the register records for them, as an ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 code. A legal representative may also carry an ISO 5009 role.iso5009Code when the role has an equivalent for the company’s legal form.

Other Key Persons

role.standardized on an other key person takes its values from a separate, shorter list: Secretary and Auditor have their own value, every other role is Other.
A role the register adds later, outside this list, is returned with the register’s wording in localName and translated at request time.

Shareholders

Structured shareholders are available as a separate shareholders datapoint, read from the Malta Business Registry’s share register data. No document purchase or AI parsing is involved.
Founding subscribers (the signatories of the memorandum at incorporation) are returned under otherKeyPersons and are not treated as current shareholders. Partnerships have no share register, so their shareholders list is empty.

Activity Codes

The Malta Business Registry records one area of activity per entity: the primary activity declared by the company, chosen from the register’s own NACE Rev. 2 list. It is a register statement, not an inference.
When the register records no area of activity for the entity, activities and activityDescription are both absent.Most Rev. 2 classes have one Rev. 2.1 successor, and NACE then carries isAIInferred: false. Where Rev. 2.1 split or deleted the class, the Rev. 2.1 code is chosen from the activity description, or the group that contains the candidates, and carries isAIInferred: true (for example 64.20 becomes 64.21). NACE_REV2 always holds the register’s own code.

Data Availability

Data Availability Matrix

Legend: ✅ Available | ❌ Not Available | ⚠️ Conditionally Available | Async = Asynchronous processing

Documents by Company Type

Malta documents are fee-based and retrieved from the Maltese register. Document types and prices come from the register’s filing list and are surfaced through availableDocuments.
Paid Documents: Malta documents can incur a register fee. Check the pricing page or availableDocuments before purchase. The document listing itself is free.

Example API Responses

All examples use placeholder data. Query: POST /v2/company with { "id": "<id>", "countryCode": "MT", "dataPoints": ["company", "legalRepresentatives", "otherKeyPersons"] }
Note: This company recorded no area of activity, so activities and activityDescription are absent. Once a company is being wound up, its liquidator represents it and is returned under legalRepresentatives.
Note: Partnerships carry no share capital and no euid. Some partnerships record no people at the register; their partners are only in the deed of partnership.
Documents are returned when "dataPoints": ["availableDocuments"] is requested, grouped by category. Pass a document id in documents to buy it.
Document pricing summary: Malta document pricing varies by filing type. Use availableDocuments or the pricing page before purchase.