Legal form

The legal form decides who is liable for a company's obligations, what it has to file, and what the register publishes about it. In Finland the most common is the private limited company (osakeyhtiö, Oy), where the owners' liability is limited to what they put in.

The forms the register records, most common first: Oy — osakeyhtiö, private limited company. The most common form.; Oyj — julkinen osakeyhtiö, public limited company; Ky — kommandiittiyhtiö, limited partnership; Ay — avoin yhtiö, general partnership; Tmi — toiminimi, sole trader; Osk — osuuskunta, cooperative; Ry — rekisteröity yhdistys, registered association.