Receivables are claims — a right to demand payment from a named debtor. Control over a company often rests not in its equity structure but in who holds, assigns, or has pledged its receivables portfolio. Establishing that picture requires a specific sequence of official sources, each with a defined ceiling.
The sources do not speak uniformly. A filed balance sheet may record a receivables line without identifying the debtor. A pledge register may show an assignment without confirming whether the underlying claim is still live. The gap between those two facts is itself a finding.
What the sources showExistence of receivables as a balance-sheet line; pledges or assignments filed in security registers; enforcement proceedings against named debtors in court records. Verified against filed documents · sверено 2026-03-20. Condition of accessVaries by jurisdiction: some registers require a declared legitimate interest; others are open without registration. No single cross-border portal covers all 35 jurisdictions in this track. What the sources do not showWhether an individual receivable has been collected, written off, or settled privately. Absence of a court record is not proof of payment. CeilingStated before payment. The scope of each tier is fixed in advance; the buyer knows what will and will not be established before commissioning the report.Control in a corporate structure is not always located in the shareholder register. A company whose receivables have been pledged to a lender, factored to a third party, or assigned under a supply-chain finance arrangement may have a nominal shareholder who holds equity but a creditor who holds the cash flow. Establishing which is the case requires reading across at least three source types simultaneously.
The first source type is the filed financial statement. Where annual accounts are publicly filed, the receivables line on the balance sheet records the aggregate book value of outstanding claims. That figure is a starting point, not a conclusion. It does not identify individual debtors, does not distinguish current from overdue claims, and does not reflect post-filing collections.
The second source type is the security or pledge register. In jurisdictions that maintain a public register of charges, a pledge over receivables — whether specific or floating — will appear as a registered encumbrance. The register entry names the secured creditor and the date of registration. It does not confirm the current balance of the secured obligation or whether the pledge has been released informally without a formal discharge filing.
The third source type is the court and enforcement record. Where a company has commenced proceedings to recover a receivable, or where a debtor has disputed a claim, the court file may contain the amount, the parties, and the procedural status. Enforcement records — bailiff registers, attachment orders — may show whether a judgment has been obtained and whether execution has been attempted.
Reading these three layers together produces a picture of the receivables position. Reading any one layer alone produces a partial picture that can mislead.
Receivables are transferable assets. A company may sell a receivable outright to a factor, assign it as collateral to a lender, or sub-participate it within a structured finance arrangement. Each transfer may or may not appear in a public register, depending on the jurisdiction and the structure used.
Where an assignment is registered, the register entry identifies the assignee and the date. It does not confirm whether the assigned claim was valid at the point of transfer, whether the debtor was notified, or whether the debtor has a counterclaim that would reduce the recoverable amount.
Where an assignment is not registered — because the jurisdiction does not require registration of receivables assignments, or because the parties chose a structure that falls outside the registration obligation — the source layer is silent. Silence in the register is not confirmation that no assignment exists.
This is a structural limit of the source layer, not a gap in the analysis. The report names the layer at which the chain becomes unverifiable and states the reason.
In jurisdictions where annual accounts are filed with a commercial register, the balance sheet records receivables under current assets. The notes to the accounts may disaggregate the figure by debtor category, maturity, or currency. In some jurisdictions, related-party receivables are disclosed separately.
The filing date matters. A balance sheet dated twelve months before the analysis reflects a position that may have changed materially. A company that has collected, written off, or assigned its receivables portfolio in the intervening period will show a different position in the next filing — which may not yet be available.
Where accounts are not filed publicly — because the jurisdiction does not require it, because the entity type is exempt, or because the filing obligation has not been met — the balance-sheet layer is absent. The report records that absence explicitly. It does not substitute an estimate.
A receivable that has been disputed or unpaid may have generated a court file. In jurisdictions with publicly searchable court databases, a search against the company name or registration number will return cases in which the company appears as claimant or defendant. The case record may identify the debtor, the amount claimed, and the procedural stage.
Enforcement records — where maintained publicly — show whether a judgment creditor has taken steps to execute against a debtor's assets. An attachment order against a bank account or a garnishment order against a third-party debtor of the judgment debtor are both enforcement steps that appear in some jurisdictions' public records.
The limit here is consistent across jurisdictions: a negative result in a court search confirms only that no indexed case was found. It does not confirm that no dispute exists, that no arbitration is pending, or that no out-of-court settlement has been reached.
When the balance sheet records a receivables figure that does not correspond to any enforcement activity, two explanations are possible: the receivables are performing and no enforcement has been needed, or the receivables are impaired and have not been pursued. The source layer cannot distinguish between those two states without additional documents.
When a pledge register shows a charge over receivables but the balance sheet shows a low or zero receivables figure, the charge may be over future receivables, or the underlying receivables may have been collected and the charge not yet discharged. Both are findings. Neither is an error in the source.
When a court record shows a judgment in favour of the company but no enforcement record follows, the judgment may have been satisfied voluntarily, may be subject to appeal, or may be dormant. The source layer records the judgment; it does not record what happened after.
These discrepancies are reported as findings, not resolved by inference.
The source layer for receivables has a defined ceiling. That ceiling is stated before any work begins, not after.
What can be established from official sources:
What cannot be established from official sources:
The report does not fill these gaps with inference. It names them, states the source that would be required to close them, and notes whether that source is accessible in the relevant jurisdiction.