regulations name
Are DBA / &quot;trading as&quot; names always different than legal names?
<p>In many jurisdictions, any "trading as", DBA ("doing business as") or similar "ficitonal" or "pseudonymous" names of a company or other legal entity have to be registered.</p>

<p>The assumption <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trade_name" rel="nofollow noreferrer">e.g. on Wikipedia</a> would seem to be that <strong>the DBA name "differs from the registered, legal name of the business"</strong> (seems common sense).</p>

<p>Are there any prominent counter-examples that suggest that <strong>this assumption</strong> ("DBA / "trading as" names always different than legal names") doesn't hold for 100% of entities in 100% of jurisdictions?</p>

<p>The question is, to put it more simply, "Are there any examples of 'X doing business as X' or any examples of rules that disallow 'X trading as X' explicitly?"</p>

<p>As in the reference and the first paragraph, the question is about duly registered "trading as" names and not any colloquialisms.</p>

<p>Related:</p>

<p><a href="https://law.stackexchange.com/questions/22632/in-houston-texas-do-you-need-a-dba-if-you-only-conduct-business-in-the-llcs-n">In Houston, Texas, do you need a DBA if you only conduct business in the LLC&#39;s name?</a></p>

<p>Almost by definition, a trade name under which someone does business is not their real name, because otherwise one would just be using their own name and not a trade name.</p>

<p>There are some banks that informally call any business account of a sole proprietor as "DBA account" even if the account is simply in the name of the sole proprietor, but this is a colloquial and inexact usage. For example, I am a sole proprietor and have a business account in the name "Andrew Oh-Willeke, Esq." which bankers sometimes call, somewhat inaccurately, a "DBA account" when it is really (and officially under the bank's contracts) a "business account" of a sole proprietor. They are informally called "DBA accounts" because most sole proprietors, unlike me, who have business accounts operate under a trade name even if they don't have a formal entity.</p>

<p>Any other counter-examples, like this one, would simply be examples of sloppy use of language in an informal sense, rather than an official proper usage of the term.</p>

<p>Some jurisdictions require all businesses to have registered names, and in those cases, I suspect that sometime people informally refer to the registered name of the business of a sole proprietor who does business in their true name as the DBA of that business even though it would not be technically correct to do so.</p>

<p>It might be easier to provide a better answer if you explained any reason why you might think that the answer would be different, or that a different answer might matter in some context, or in a particular jurisdiction.</p>

<p>The only mention in your link of registration of trading names, anywhere in the world, refers to "businesses trading under fictitious names". Since a business trading under its own name does not fall into that category, apparently you cannot register your own name as a trading name. (I still fail to see why anybody would ever want to.)</p>

<p>Why would anyone put a company forward as &quot;Acme Widgets, dba Acme Widgets&quot;?  It's like saying &quot;John Steinbeck, whose pen name is John Steinbeck.&quot;</p>
<p>The point of having company X register the fact that it's trading under the name Y is to make it a part of the public record, in part to avoid underhanded dealings.  But company X already registered its name X in the first place, when it was formed.  There's no need to register the same name a second time.</p>
