REGULATION (EC) No 958/2007 OF THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK
of 27 July 2007
concerning statistics on the assets and liabilities of investment funds
(ECB/2007/8)
THE GOVERNING COUNCIL OF THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK,
Having regard to the Statute of the European System of Central Banks and of the European Central Bank, and in particular Article 5 thereof,
Having regard to Council Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 of 23 November 1998 concerning the collection of statistical information by the European Central Bank (1), and in particular Articles 5(1) and 6(4) thereof,
Whereas:
(1)
Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 provides in Article 2(1) that, for the fulfilment of its statistical reporting requirements, the European Central Bank (ECB), assisted by the national central banks (NCBs), has the right to collect statistical information within the limits of the reference reporting population and of what is necessary to carry out the tasks of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB). It follows from Article 2(2)(a) of Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 that investment funds (IFs) form part of the reference reporting population for the purposes of fulfilling the ECB’s statistical reporting requirements, inter alia, in the field of money and banking statistics. Furthermore, Article 3 of Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 requires the ECB to specify the actual reporting population within the limits of the reference reporting population and entitles it fully or partly to exempt specific classes of reporting agents from its statistical reporting requirements.
(2)
In order to fulfil its tasks and monitor financial activities other than those undertaken by monetary financial institutions (MFIs), the ESCB requires high-quality statistical information on the business of IFs. The principal purpose of these data is to provide the ECB with a comprehensive statistical picture of the IF sector in the participating Member States, which are viewed as one economic territory.
(3)
To limit the reporting burden, NCBs are allowed to collect the necessary information on IFs from the actual reporting population as part of a broader statistical reporting framework which serves other statistical purposes, provided that the fulfilment of the ECB’s statistical requirements is not jeopardised. In order to foster transparency, in such cases it is appropriate to inform the reporting agents that data are collected to fulfil other statistical purposes.
(4)
Having data available on financial transactions facilitates a more in-depth analysis for monetary policy and other purposes. Data on financial transactions, as well as data on stocks, are also used to compile other statistics, in particular the euro area financial accounts.
(5)
Although regulations adopted under Article 34.1 of the Statute do not confer any rights or impose any obligations on non-participating Member States, Article 5 of the Statute applies to all Member States, whether or not they have adopted the euro. Recital 17 to Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 makes clear that Article 5 of the Statute, together with Article 10 (ex Article 5) of the Treaty, implies an obligation to design and implement at national level all the measures that the non-participating Member States consider appropriate to collect the statistical information needed to fulfil the ECB’s statistical reporting requirements and make timely preparations in the field of statistics for becoming participating Member States.
(6)
Although this Regulation is primarily addressed to IFs, complete information on holders of bearer shares issued by IFs may not be directly available from IFs, and it is therefore necessary to include other entities in the reporting population.
(7)
The ECB’s sanctions regime laid down in Article 7 of Regulation (EC) No 2533/98 will apply to IFs.
(8)
By 2012 at the latest, the Governing Council will assess whether to only allow Member States whose investment fund sector, in terms of total assets, accounts for less than a minimum share of overall assets under management in the euro area, to use the aggregated reporting approach established under this Regulation,
HAS ADOPTED THIS REGULATION:
Article 1
Definitions
For the purposes of this Regulation:
-
‘IF’ means a collective investment undertaking that:
(a)
invests in financial and non-financial assets, within the meaning of Annex II, to the extent that its objective is investing capital raised from the public; and
(b)
is constituted pursuant to Community or national law under:
(i)
contract law (as a common fund managed by management companies);
(ii)
trust law (as a unit trust);
(iii)
company law (as an investment company); or
(iv)
any other similar mechanism.
The following are included within the definition of IF:
(a)
those undertakings whose units or shares are, at the request of the holders, repurchased or redeemed directly or indirectly out of the undertaking’s assets; and
(b)
those undertakings which have a fixed number of issued shares and whose shareholders have to buy or sell existing shares when entering or leaving the fund.
The following are not included in the definition of IF:
(a)
pension funds within the meaning of Article 2(2)(a) of and Annex B to Regulation (EC) No 2533/98; and
(b)
money market funds within the meaning of Annex I to Regulation (EC) No 2423/2001 of the European Central Bank of 22 November 2001 concerning the consolidated balance sheet of the monetary financial institutions sector (ECB/2001/13) (2).
For the purposes of the definition of IF, ‘public’ shall encompass retail, professional and institutional investors;
-
‘participating Member State’ means a Member State that has adopted the euro;
-
‘non-participating Member State’ means a Member State that has not adopted the euro;
-
‘reporting agent’ means a reporting agent within the meaning of Article 1 of Regulation (EC) No 2533/98;
-
‘resident’ means resident within the meaning of Article 1 of Regulation (EC) No 2533/98. For the purposes of this Regulation, and in the absence of any significant physical dimension to a legal entity, its residence shall be determined by the economic territory under whose laws the entity is incorporated. If the entity is not incorporated, legal domicile shall be used as a criterion, namely the country whose legal system governs the creation and continued existence of the entity;
-
‘MFI’ means a monetary financial institution within the meaning of paragraph 1 of Part 1 of Annex I to Regulation (EC) No 2423/2001 (ECB/2001/13);
-
‘OFI’ means other financial intermediaries except insurance corporations and pension funds, within the meaning of Article 2(2)(a) of and Annex B to Regulation (EC) No 2533/98;
-
‘relevant NCB’ means the NCB of the participating Member State in which the IF in question is resident.
Article 2
Actual reporting population
1. The actual reporting population shall consist of the IFs resident in the territory of the participating Member States. The IF itself or, in the case of IFs that do not have legal personality under their national law, the persons legally entitled to represent them shall be responsible for reporting the statistical information required under this Regulation.
2. Without prejudice to paragraph 1, for the purpose of collecting information on the holders of bearer shares issued by IFs (paragraph 3 in Part 2 of Annex I), the actual reporting population shall include MFIs and those OFIs that are not IFs. The NCBs may grant derogations to these entities provided that the required statistical information is collected from other available sources in accordance with paragraph 3 in Part 2 of Annex I. The NCBs shall check the fulfilment of this condition in good time in order to grant or withdraw, if necessary, any derogation with effect from the start of each year, in agreement with the ECB. For the purposes of this Regulation, the NCBs may establish and maintain a list of reporting OFIs that are not IFs, in accordance with the principles laid down in paragraph 3 in Part 2 of Annex I.
Article 3
Derogations
1. The NCBs may grant derogations to the smallest IFs in terms of total assets, provided that the IFs that contribute to the quarterly aggregated balance sheet account for at least 95 % of the total of IFs’ assets in terms of stocks, in each participating Member State. The NCBs shall check the fulfilment of this condition in good time in order to grant or withdraw, if necessary, any derogation with effect from the start of each calendar year. The IFs to which such derogations apply shall only report, on a quarterly basis: end-of-quarter stock data on IF shares/units issued; and the corresponding quarterly revaluation adjustments or transactions, if applicable.
2. Derogations may be granted to IFs that are subject to national accounting rules which allow the valuation of their assets less frequently than quarterly. The IF categories to which NCBs shall have the discretion to grant derogations shall be decided by the Governing Council. The IFs to which such derogations apply shall be subject to the requirements set out in Article 6 of this Regulation at a frequency consistent with their accounting obligations regarding the timing of valuation of their assets.
3. The IFs may choose not to make use of the derogations and to fulfil the full reporting requirements specified in Article 6 instead. If an IF makes such a choice, it shall obtain the relevant NCB’s consent prior to any change in its use of these derogations.
Article 4
List of IFs for statistical purposes
1. The Executive Board shall establish and maintain a list of IFs subject to this Regulation, including, where applicable, their sub-funds, within the meaning of Article 5(2). The list may be based on existing lists of IFs supervised by national authorities, where such lists are available, supplemented by other IFs falling within the definition of IFs in Article 1.
2. The NCBs and the ECB shall make the list of IFs for statistical purposes, and its updates, accessible to the IFs concerned in an appropriate way, including by electronic means, via the Internet or, at the request of the reporting agents concerned, in paper form.
3. The list of IFs for statistical purposes shall be for information only. However, in the event that the latest accessible electronic version of the list referred to in paragraph 2 is incorrect, the ECB shall not impose sanctions on any entity which did not properly fulfil its reporting requirements to the extent that it relied in good faith on the incorrect list.
Article 5
Fund-by-fund reporting
1. The actual reporting population shall report data on its assets and liabilities on a fund-by-fund basis.
2. Without prejudice to paragraph 1, if an IF segregates its assets into different sub-funds in such a way that shares/units relating to each sub-fund are independently backed by different assets, each sub-fund shall be considered as an individual IF.
3. By derogation from paragraphs 1 and 2, subject to the prior approval and in accordance with the instructions of the relevant NCB, IFs may report their assets and liabilities as a group, provided that this leads to results that are similar to fund-by-fund reporting.
Article 6
Quarterly and monthly statistical reporting requirements
1. The actual reporting population shall provide, in accordance with Annex I:
(a)
on a quarterly basis, end-of-quarter stock data on the assets and liabilities of IFs, and quarterly revaluation adjustments or transactions, where applicable; and
(b)
on a monthly basis, end-of-month stock data on IF shares/units issued and the corresponding monthly revaluation adjustments or transactions, if applicable.
2. Subject to the prior approval and in accordance with the instructions of the relevant NCB, the actual reporting population shall report statistical information on the basis of one of the two reporting approaches specified in Annex I, in conformity with the definitions in Annex II.
3. The NCBs may choose to collect the data in paragraph 1(a) on a monthly instead of on a quarterly basis.
Article 7
Revaluation adjustments or transactions
1. The actual reporting population shall report revaluation adjustments or transactions, in accordance with the relevant NCB’s instructions, for the aggregated information reported under the combined or aggregated approach specified in Annex I.
2. Under the combined approach specified in Annex I, NCBs may either derive approximations of security transactions from the security-by-security (s-b-s) information or directly collect transactions on an s-b-s basis.
3. Further requirements and guidelines regarding the compilation of revaluation adjustments or transactions are laid down in Annex III.
Article 8
Accounting rules
1. The accounting rules followed by IFs for the purposes of reporting under this Regulation shall be those laid down in the relevant national law implementing Council Directive 86/635/EEC of 8 December 1986 on the annual accounts and consolidated accounts of banks and other financial institutions (3), or, if the former provision is inapplicable, in any other national or international standards that apply to IFs.
2. Without prejudice to accounting practices and netting arrangements prevailing in the participating Member States, all financial assets and liabilities shall be reported on a gross basis for statistical purposes.
Article 9
Timeliness
1. The NCBs shall decide when they need to receive data from reporting agents pursuant to Article 6 in order to meet the deadlines laid down in paragraph 2.
2. The NCBs shall transmit to the ECB:
(a)
aggregated quarterly stocks and revaluation adjustments by close of business on the 28th working day following the end of the quarter to which the data relate, based on the quarterly data collected from IFs; and
(b)
aggregated monthly stocks and revaluation adjustments by close of business on the 28th working day following the end of the month to which the data relate, based on the monthly data on IF shares/units issued collected from IFs or based on actual data according to Article 6(3).
Article 10
Minimum standards and national reporting arrangements
1. The required statistical information shall be reported by the IF to the relevant NCB in accordance with the minimum standards for transmission, accuracy, conceptual compliance and revisions specified in Annex IV.
2. The NCBs shall define and implement the reporting arrangements to be followed by the actual reporting population in accordance with national characteristics. The NCBs shall ensure that these reporting arrangements provide the required statistical information and allow accurate checking of compliance with the minimum standards for transmission, accuracy, conceptual compliance and revisions specified in Annex IV.
Article 11
Mergers, divisions and reorganisations
In the event of a merger, division or reorganisation that might affect the fulfilment of its statistical obligations, the reporting agent involved shall inform the relevant NCB, once the intention to implement such operation has become public and in due time before it takes effect, of the procedures that are planned to fulfil the statistical reporting requirements set out in this Regulation.
Article 12
Verification and compulsory collection
The NCBs shall exercise the rights to verify or to collect compulsorily the information which reporting agents provide pursuant to this Regulation, without prejudice to the ECB’s right to exercise these rights itself. These rights shall in particular be exercised by the NCBs when an institution included in the actual reporting population does not fulfil the minimum standards for transmission, accuracy, conceptual compliance and revisions specified in Annex IV.
Article 13
First reporting
First reporting shall begin with monthly and quarterly data for December 2008.
Article 14
Final provision
This Regulation shall enter into force on the 20th day following its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.
Done at Frankfurt am Main, 27 July 2007.