EN ECB-PUBLIC  
 
OPINION OF THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK 
of 7 January 2022  
on the establishment by the Central Bank of Ireland of a database on safe-deposit boxes and bank 
and payment accounts  
(CON/2022/2)  
 Introduction and legal basis 
On 16 December 2021 the European Central Bank (ECB ) received a request from the Irish Minister for 
Finance for an opinion on the European Union (Anti-Money Laundering: Central Mechanism for Information on Safe-Deposit Boxes and Bank and Pa yment Accounts) Regulations 2021 (hereinafter the 
‘draft law’). 
The ECB’s competence to deliver an opinion is based on Articles 127(4) and 282(5) of the Treaty on the 
Functioning of the European Union and the third in dent of Article 2(1) of Council Decision 98/415/EC
1, as 
the draft law relates to the Central Bank of Ireland (CBI). In accordance with the first sentence of 
Article 17.5 of the Rules of Procedure of the Eur opean Central Bank, the Governing Council has adopted 
this opinion. 
 
1. Purpose of the draft law 1.1 The draft law seeks to implement the require ment under Article 32a of Directive 2015/849/EU of 
the European Parliament and of the Council (hereinafter the ‘AMLD4’)
2 as introduced by an 
amendment in 20183 by designating the CBI as responsibl e for the establishment and maintenance 
of a database containing inform ation on natural or legal perso ns holding bank and payment 
accounts identified by an IBAN in Ireland, and nat ural or legal persons controlling safe-deposit 
boxes held by a credit institution in Ireland (hereinafter the ‘Central Mechanism’)4. 
1.2 The Central Mechanism must contain payment  and bank account numbers, the names of the 
 
1  Council Decision 98/415/EC of 29 June 1998 on the c onsultation of the European Central Bank by national 
authorities regarding draft legislative pr ovisions (OJ L 189, 3.7.1998, p. 42). 
2  Directive (EU) 2015/849 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 20 May 2015 on the prevention of the use 
of the financial system for the purposes of money launder ing or terrorist financing, amending Regulation (EU) 
No 648/2012 of the European Parliament  and of the Council, and repealing Dir ective 2005/60/EC of the European 
Parliament and of the Council and Commission Directive 2006/70/EC (OJ L  141, 5.6.2015, p. 73) . 
3  See Directive (EU) 2018/843 of the Eu ropean Parliament and of the Counc il of 30 May 2018 amending Directive 
(EU) 2015/849 on the prevention of the use of the financial system for t he purposes of money laundering or terrorist 
financing, and amending Directives 2009/138/EC and 2013/36 /EU (OJ L 156, 19.6.2018, p. 43) (hereinafter the 
‘AMLD5’). 
4  Article 32a of the AMLD4 as amended by the AMLD5 requires that Member St ates establish centralised automated 
registries which allow the i dentification of any natural or legal persons  holding or controlling payment accounts and 
bank accounts identified by IBAN, and safe-deposit boxes held by  a credit institution within their territory, and for the 
information held in the Central Mechanism to be directly a ccessible to national financial intelligence units (FIUs), and 
the national competent authorities (N CAs) designated under the AMLD4.  
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2 account holders, the names of the persons autho rised to manage these accounts and the names of 
persons with lease contracts for safe-deposit bo xes with credit institutions. Consequently, the 
Central Mechanism is to contain personal data as understood by Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the 
European Parliament and of the Council (General Data Protection Regulation)5 with the CBI acting 
as data controller of this information.   
1.3 Under the draft law credit institutions will be r equired to provide the CBI with certain information 
through the Central Mechanism on their custom ers, beneficial owners of their customers, 
information on bank and payment accounts, and on safe- deposit boxes held at the credit institution.  
1.4 The draft law allows members of FIU Ireland (a divi sion of the Irish police service) to search for and 
retrieve information contained in the Central Mech anism via a ‘Central Database’ which is also to 
be established and maintained by the CBI under the draft law. 
1.5 As noted in the consultation request accompanyi ng the draft law, the Minister has committed that 
the Central Mechanism will be funded through a cost recovery mechanism, using State Exchequer 
funding. The Minister has directed that no funding for this mechanism will ultimately come from the 
CBI’s own provisions. Therefore, the policy decision is that the CBI will have no role in funding the 
responsibility that it is being assigned. Howeve r, the draft law does not contain any provision 
specifying that the mechanism will be funded from St ate Exchequer funding. This is due to the 
need for primary legislation for such provisions, whereas the CBI is being designated as 
responsible for the management of the Central Me chanism through secondary legislation. Primary 
legislation to provide for State Exchequer f unding will be developed and once approved it will be 
progressed through the Irish legislative process.  However, in the meantime the Minister has 
committed to recoup any costs incurred by the CBI.    
 
2. Conferral of a new task on the Central Bank of Ireland 
2.1 New task of the Central Bank of Ireland 
2.1.1 The establishment and maintenance by the CBI of the Central Mechanism is separate and distinct 
from the CBI’s existing role as an NCA designat ed under the AMLD4 and as the supervisor of 
compliance by credit and financial institutions with anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist 
financing (AML/CFT) requirements. While Article 3 2a of the AMLD4 requires that the information 
contained in the centralised database be acce ssible to NCAs designated under the AMLD4, the 
establishment and maintenance of the Central Mech anism will primarily facilitate the investigative 
role of the law enforcement authorities in Ireland. 
2.1.2 Furthermore, the obligations to be placed on the CBI in the draft law are separate and additional to 
the current responsibilities of the CBI with regard to Ireland’s implementation of Article 30 of the 
AMLD4 and the CBI’s establishment and maintenance of  a central register of the beneficial owners 
of certain financial entities regulated by it6.   
 
5  Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 27 April 2016 on the protection of 
natural persons with regard to the pr ocessing of personal data and on the free movement of such data, and 
repealing Directive 95/46/EC (General Data Prot ection Regulation) (OJ L 119, 4.5.2016, p. 1).   
6  See ECB Opinion CON/2020/18. All EC B opinions are published on EUR-Lex. 
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3 2.1.3 The ECB underlines that a proposed conferral of  new tasks on a national central bank (NCB) in the 
European System of Central Banks (ESCB) must  be assessed against the prohibition on monetary 
financing under Article 123 of the Treaty. For the pur poses of that prohibition, Article 1(1)(b)(ii) of 
Council Regulation (EC) No 3603/937 defines ‘other type of credit facility’, inter alia, as ‘any 
financing of the public sector’s obli gations vis-à-vis third parties’. 
2.1.4 Ensuring that Member States implement a s ound budgetary policy is one of the key objectives of 
the monetary financing prohibition,  which may not be circumvented8. Therefore, the task of 
financing measures, which are normally the responsibility of the Member States, and which are financed from their budgetary sources rather than by  the NCBs, must not be entrusted to NCBs. To 
decide what constitutes financing of the public sector ’s obligations vis-à-vis third parties, which can 
be translated as the provision of central bank financ ing outside the scope of central bank tasks, it is 
necessary to carry out, on a case-by-case basi s, an assessment of w hether the task to be 
undertaken by an NCB is a central bank task or a government task, i.e. a task within the 
responsibilities of t he Member States.  
2.1.5 As part of its discretion in the exercise of it s duty, on the basis of Articl e 271(d) of the Treaty and 
Article 35.6 of the Statute of the European Syst em of Central Banks and of the European Central 
Bank (hereinafter the ‘Statute of the ESCB’), to ensure that NCBs honour the obligations laid down 
by the Treaty, the Governing Council has endorsed criteria for determining what may be seen as 
falling within the scope of a public sector obligatio n within the meaning of Article 1(1)(b)(ii) of 
Regulation (EC) No 3603/93 or, in other words, what constitutes a government task as follows: 
First, central bank tasks are in particular those ta sks that are related to the tasks that have been 
conferred upon the ECB and the NCBs by the Treaty  and the Statute of the ESCB. These tasks are 
mainly defined in Article 127(2), (5) and (6) and Article 128(1) of the Treaty, as well as Article 22 and Article 25.1 of the Statute of the ESCB. 
Second, as Article 14.4 of the Statute of the ESC B allows NCBs to perform ‘other functions’, new 
tasks, i.e. tasks that are not related to task s that have been conferred upon the ECB and the NCBs, 
are not precluded per se. However, new tasks that are undertaken by an NCB and which are 
atypical of NCB tasks or which are clearly disc harged on behalf of, and in the exclusive interest of 
the government or of other public sector ent ities should be considered government tasks. 
Third, an important criterion for qualifying a new ta sk as atypical of an NCB task or as being clearly 
discharged on behalf of and in the exclusive inte rest of the government or other public sector 
entities is the impact of the task on the institut ional, financial and personal independence of that 
NCB.  
In particular, the following aspects should be taken into account: 
(a) whether the performance of the new task creates  conflicts of interest with existing central 
bank tasks, which are not adequately addressed, and does not necessarily complement 
those existing central bank tasks. If a confli ct of interest arises between existing and new 
 
7  Council Regulation (EC) No 3603/93 of 13 December 1993 specifying definitions for the application of the 
prohibitions referred to in Articles 104 and 104b(1 ) of the Treaty (OJ L 332, 31.12.1993, p. 1). 
8  Article 123 of the Treaty also serves the objective of  maintaining price stability and reinforces central bank 
independence. 
ECB-PUBLIC  
4 tasks, sufficient safeguards to mitigate that c onflict should be in place. The complementarity 
between a new task and existing central bank tasks should not be interpreted broadly, so as to lead to the creation of an indefinite chain of  ancillary tasks. Such complementarity should 
be examined in relation to the financing of those tasks; 
(b) whether without new financial resources the pe rformance of the new task is disproportionate 
to the NCB’s financial or organisational capacity, and may have a negative impact on the 
capacity to properly perform t he existing central bank tasks; 
(c) whether the performance of the new task fits into the institutional set-up of the NCB in the 
light of central bank independence and accountability considerations; 
(d) whether the performance of the new ta sk harbours substantial financial risks; 
(e) whether the performance of the new task ex poses the members of the NCB decision-making 
bodies to political risks that are disproportionate and may also have an impact on their 
personal independence and, in particular, on the guarantee of term of office set out in 
Article 14.2 of the Statute. 
2.1.6 Based on the criteria set out above, the following  paragraphs assess whether the CBI’s new task is 
in line with the prohibition of monetary financing. 
2.2 Tasks related to the tasks conferred upon the EC B and the NCBs by the Treaty and the Statute of 
the ESCB 
The task of establishing and maintaining the Ce ntral Database and the Central Mechanism for the 
purposes of the prevention, detection or investi gation of possible money laundering or terrorist 
financing is not in any respect related to the tasks conferred upon the ECB and the NCBs by the 
Treaty and the Statute of the ESCB.  
2.3 Tasks which are atypical of central bank tasks   
The task of establishing and maintaining the C entral Database and the Central Mechanism is an 
atypical task for an NCB. The ECB has previously opined that tasks entrusted to an NCB relating to 
the establishment of a central r egister of bank accounts are not central bank tasks nor do they 
facilitate the enforcement of such tasks
9. 
2.4 Tasks clearly discharged on behalf of and in  the exclusive interest of the government 
Notwithstanding the CBI’s existing role as an NCA designated under the AMLD4, the ECB 
considers the new task in the draft law to be exclusively discharged on behalf of and in the interest 
of the Irish government, as its purpose is to di scharge the latter’s obligations under Article 32a of 
the AMLD4, and to further the Irish government’s interest in being able to efficiently access 
information for the prevention, detection or invest igation of money laundering or terrorist financing. 
2.5 Extent to which performance of the new task creates  conflicts of interest with existing central bank 
tasks 
The performance of the task of establishing and maintaining the Central Database and the Central 
Mechanism is unlikely to give rise to any conflicts of interest arising with the CBI’s existing central 
 
9  See paragraph 2.1 of Opinion CO N/2011/30, paragraph 3.1.3 of Opinion CON/2015/36, paragraph 3. 1.3 of Opinion 
CON/2015/46 and paragraph 2.2.5.1 of t he ECB’s Convergence Report, May 2018. 
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5 bank tasks.   
2.6 Extent to which performance of the new task is disproportionate to the financial or organisational 
capacity of the CBI 
2.6.1 As previously noted by the ECB10, the principle of financial inde pendence requires that Member 
States must not put their NCBs in  a position where they have insufficient resources to carry out 
both their ESCB-related tasks and their nati onal tasks, from an operational and financial 
perspective. Furthermore, when allocating specif ic new tasks to NCBs, each NCB concerned 
should have sufficient financial and human resources at its disposal to ens ure that the tasks can be 
carried out without impacting on the NCB’s financial or operational capacity to perform its ESCB-
related tasks. In order to ensure that the CBI’ s capacity to perform its ESCB-related tasks is not 
impaired, the CBI must, therefore, be able to avail it self of the necessary resources to carry out its 
responsibilitie s under the draft law.  
2.6.2 The ECB understands that the cost of establishing and maintaining the Central Database and the 
Central Mechanism has not yet been clarified in law.  The draft law does not provide for the funding 
of the CBI’s task from government  funds. However, this is to be provided for in separate primary 
legislation that has yet to be enacted; in the in terim the Minister for Finance has committed to 
recoup any costs incurred by the CBI. The ECB in vites the consulting authority to consider the 
impact of the draft law on the resources of the CB I and provide legal clarity on the reimbursement 
mechanism in order to avoid any potential  breach of Article 123 of the Treaty. 
2.7 Extent to which performance of the new task fits in to the institutional set-up of the CBI, in the light 
of central bank indepen dence and accountab ility considerations 
As noted previously, the draft law places separate and additional obligations on the CBI to those of 
maintaining a central register of the beneficial owners. The ECB understands that the operation of 
the Central Database and the Central Mechanism w ill be functionally separated from the AML/CFT 
and prudential supervisory roles of the CBI. It does  not therefore appear that the new task would 
complement the CBI’s existing central bank tasks.  
2.8 Extent to which the performance of ta sks harbours substa ntial financial risks 
The performance of the new tasks does not harb our substantial financial risks for the CBI. The 
ECB understands that the tasks conferred on t he CBI under the draft law would fall within the 
meaning of its functions or pow ers, such that the CBI will not  be liable for damages for anything 
done or omitted in the performance or purported perf ormance or exercise of any of its functions or 
powers, unless it is proved that t he act or omission was in bad faith11.  
2.9 Extent to which the performance of the new task  exposes members of the decision-making bodies 
of the CBI to disproportionate political risks and impacts on their personal independence 
The performance of the new functi ons conferred under the draft law does not appear to expose the 
CBI’s decision-making bodies to any disproport ionate political risk or have an impact on their 
personal independence. However, the possibility ca nnot be entirely excluded that the CBI would be 
 
10  See, for example, paragraph 4.6.1 of Opinion CON/2018/21. 
11  See Section 33AJ(2) of the Central Bank Act 1942. 
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6 exposed to reputational risks should the info rmation in the databases be accessed by non-
authorised persons.  
2.10 Conclusions 
The new tasks conferred on the CBI are essentially government tasks as their purpose is to further 
the State’s interest in being able to efficiently access information for t he prevention, detection or 
investigation of money laundering or terrorist financing. These new tasks are therefore discharged 
exclusively in the interest of the Irish gover nment, and cannot be regarded as central bank tasks12. 
Consequently, in order to ensure compliance wi th the monetary financing prohibition, the CBI 
needs to be fully and adequately remunerated when carrying out its tasks in relation to the 
establishment and maintenance of the Central Dat abase and the Central Mechanism and any other 
tasks necessary for carrying out it s responsibilities under the draft law13. In particular the CBI needs 
to be reimbursed in respect of all costs arising u nder the draft law, and such reimbursement should 
be made on the basis of ‘at arm’s length’ commer cial terms, either in advance of costs being 
incurred or on a regular and prom pt basis as the costs arise14. In order to ensure compliance with 
the monetary financing prohibition, the consulting aut hority is therefore invited to clarify through 
appropriate provisions of law that  any anticipated or actual shortfa ll of funds to defray the CBI’s 
expenses will be granted by the Minister for Finance on a regular and prompt basis as the costs arise in order to ensure that the CBI does not hav e to fund the cost of its tasks under the draft law 
from its own funds under any circumstances. Finally , it should be clarified t hat the CBI’s expenses 
incurred in discharging all of it s responsibilities with respect to draft law will be defrayed. 
 
This opinion will be published on EUR-Lex.  
  
Done at Frankfurt am Main, 7 January 2022. 
 [signed] 
 
The President of the ECB Christine LAGARDE 
 
12  See paragraph 2.1 of Opinion CON/2011/30, paragraph 3.1.3 of Opini on CON/2015/36, and paragraph 3.1.3 of 
Opinion CON/2015/46. 
13  See paragraph 2 of Opinion CON/ 2011/30; paragraph 2 of Opinion CON/ 2011/98; paragraph 3.2 of Opinion 
CON/2015/36; paragraphs 2.2, 3.2 and 3.8 of Opinion CON/2016/35; par agraph 4.4 of Opinion CON/2017/20; 
paragraph 2.3 of Opinion CO N/2018/4; paragraph 2.1 of Opinion CON/2018/57; and par agraph 2.2.5 of the ECB’s 
Convergence Report, June 2020.    
14  See paragraph 3.1.6 of Opinion CON/2015/ 36 and paragraph 2 of Opinion CON/2011/98.