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Guide · Norway · Brønnøysundregistrene

Norway bankruptcy register API

Norway records a bankruptcy against the company’s organisasjonsnummer, so one nine-digit number is the whole join. Here is what the register says, the three states that must not be confused, and how to read Norwegian bankruptcies from an API.

The short version

In Norway a bankruptcy (konkurs) is opened by a district court (tingrett), which appoints a trustee, the bostyrer. The public record is kept by Brønnøysundregistrene (Brreg): its Konkursregisteret, the bankruptcy register, records the proceedings, and its Enhetsregisteret, the Central Coordinating Register for Legal Entities, marks the entity itself. The identifier throughout is the organisasjonsnummer: nine digits with a modulus-11 check digit, which you can test in the organisasjonsnummer lookup.

That makes Norway the easy case for a KYB team. The number on a bankruptcy is the same number that identifies the company everywhere else in the register, so a bankruptcy joins to the company record on one key, with no name matching.

Three states that are not the same thing

The register distinguishes states that a headline would call “going bust”. Only the first is a bankruptcy:

State in the registerNorwegianWhat it meansIn the API
BankruptcykonkursA court has opened bankruptcy proceedings against the company.insolvency
Liquidationunder avviklingThe owners have decided to wind the company up, usually while it is solvent.Company status; not an insolvency notice
Compulsory liquidation or dissolutionunder tvangsavvikling, tvangsoppløsningA court has ordered the company wound up or dissolved, typically because it has not met a duty such as delivering its annual accounts.registry_compliance signal (forced_dissolution); not an insolvency notice

A company can be in the second or third state without being insolvent, and the API keeps them apart so that a filter on event_type=insolvency returns bankruptcies and nothing else. The compulsory-liquidation state is also served on the company record as a registry-compliance signal (see the Norway company data guide); it is a sign of a company that stopped meeting its duties, not an insolvency.

Two habits worth having

Read the date as the event date. filing_date on a Norwegian record is the date the register gives for the event: for a bankruptcy, the date of the bankruptcy, not the date the company was incorporated. Sort and filter on it for a recent-bankruptcies feed.

Search by number, not by name. Norwegian company names repeat, and a name search is a contains match that can return several entities. The organisasjonsnummer is matched exactly, so use it whenever you hold it, and use the name search to find the number when you do not.

Querying Norwegian bankruptcies from an API

Prometiam serves Norwegian corporate insolvency notices through the same endpoint as France, Germany, the UK, Austria, Switzerland, Finland, the US, the Netherlands, Denmark, Croatia, Sweden, Spain, Latvia, Estonia and Singapore. Two calls cover most uses: a feed of recent bankruptcies, and a check on one organisasjonsnummer.

# bankruptcies since a date
curl "https://api.prometiam.com/functions/v1/risk-api/insolvency/search?country=NO&event_type=insolvency&date_from=2026-09-01&limit=20" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"

# one company, by organisasjonsnummer
curl "https://api.prometiam.com/functions/v1/risk-api/insolvency/search?country=NO&company_number=987654325" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"

The response has the shape below. The record is illustrative, and the meta block is shortened.

{
  "data": [
    {
      "id": 1234567,
      "source_country": "NO",
      "source_provider": "Brønnøysundregistrene",
      "company_name": "EKSEMPEL BYGG AS",
      "company_number": "987654325",
      "event_type": "insolvency",
      "status": null,
      "local_status": null,
      "filing_date": "2026-09-10",
      "bankrupt_city": "Oslo",
      "notice_url": "https://…"
    }
  ],
  "pagination": { "count": 1, "has_more": false, "next_cursor": null },
  "meta": {
    "query_ms": 36,
    "name_match": "contains",
    "coverage_note": "CORPORATE insolvency only. Personal/consumer insolvency is deliberately excluded …"
  }
}

company_number is the organisasjonsnummer and is matched exactly. You can also search by name (a contains match, ranked by relevance, with a match_score from 0 to 100 on each row) and page through a long result with next_cursor. To check a list of counterparties in one call, POST /insolvency/check takes up to 100 items and returns each one’s five most recent notices; every item counts as one request.

From a notice to the company record

Norwegian notices are linked to company records by the organisasjonsnummer, so the number on a notice goes straight into the company search, which also serves the roles registered against the company.

curl "https://api.prometiam.com/functions/v1/risk-api/companies/search?company_number=987654325&country=NO" \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer YOUR_API_KEY"

Enhetsregisteret is open data and Brreg publishes its own free API for it. This endpoint is for teams that want Norway alongside eight other insolvency markets under one key and one response shape.

What the Norwegian coverage is, and is not

  • Corporate only. Personal insolvency is never returned. Norway is one of sixteen insolvency markets (FR, DE, GB, AT, CH, NO, FI, US, NL, DK, HR, SE, ES, LV, EE, SG).
  • Linked by organisasjonsnummer. A Norwegian notice joins to the company record on that number.
  • Register-change events only. Norway publishes no corporate-event gazette (register-change events start on 14 Oct 2026), and monitoring covers every live country except France and Chile. Send Norwegian counterparties through POST /insolvency/check on a schedule (a monitor does not report insolvency notices), and read this endpoint for a Norwegian company’s insolvency history.
  • An empty result is not proof of solvency. It means no notice was found for that search.

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FAQ

Where are Norwegian bankruptcies recorded?
A Norwegian district court (tingrett) opens the bankruptcy and appoints a trustee (bostyrer). Brønnøysundregistrene keeps the public record: its Konkursregisteret, the bankruptcy register, records the proceedings, and its Enhetsregisteret, the register of legal entities, marks the entity. The identifier is the organisasjonsnummer.

Is compulsory liquidation the same as bankruptcy in Norway?
No. A konkurs is a court-opened bankruptcy. Tvangsavvikling or tvangsoppløsning means a court has ordered the company wound up or dissolved, typically because it has not met a duty such as delivering its annual accounts. Prometiam serves only the bankruptcy as an insolvency notice (insolvency); a compulsory liquidation shows as the registry_compliance signal (forced_dissolution) on the company record, and a liquidation the owners decided shows in the company’s status.

Are Norwegian insolvency notices linked to company records?
Yes. Norway is one of the sixteen insolvency markets (FR, DE, GB, AT, CH, NO, FI, US, NL, DK, HR, SE, ES, LV, EE, SG), and its notices carry the organisasjonsnummer as company_number, so they join to the Norwegian company record from GET /companies/search?country=NO. Corporate only.

Can I monitor a Norwegian company for bankruptcy?
A monitoring subscription alerts on status changes, dissolution, sanctions matches and register changes (none before 14 Oct 2026) of a Norwegian company, not on insolvency notices. To catch a bankruptcy notice, send your counterparties through POST /insolvency/check on a schedule; it takes up to 100 items per call and every item counts as one request. An empty result is not proof of solvency.

Are sole traders or private individuals included?
Corporate insolvency only. Personal insolvency is never returned.