EN 
 
 
OPINION OF THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK 
of 15 September 2009  
on payment services  
(CON/2009/72) 
 
Introduction and legal basis  
On 26 August 2009 the European Central Bank (ECB) r eceived a request from the Romanian Ministry of 
Finance for an opinion on a draft emergency ordinance on payment services  (hereinafter the ‘draft 
emergency  ordinance’). 
The ECB’s competence to deliver an  opinion is based on Article 105(4) of the Treaty establishing the 
European Community and the third and fifth indents of Article 2(1) of Council Decision 98/415/EC of 
29 June 1998 on the consultation of the European Central Bank by national authorities regarding draft legislative provisions
1, as the draft emergency ordinance relates to Banca Na ţională a României (BNR) 
and to payment systems. In accordance with the first sentence of Article 17.5 of the Rules of Procedure of 
the European Central Bank, the Governing Council has adopted this opinion. 
 1.
  Purpose of the draft emergency ordinance 
The main purpose of the draft emergency ordinance is to transpose into Romanian legislation Directive 
2007/64/EC of the European Parliament and of th e Council of 13 November 2007 on payment services in 
the internal market amending Directives 97/7/ EC, 2002/65/EC, 2005/60/EC and 2006/48/EC and 
repealing Directive 97/5/EC2.  
The draft emergency ordinance establishes the requi rements for the provision of payment services in 
Romania and regulates the prudential supervision of payment institutions, as well as the rights and 
obligations of users and providers of payment ser vices in the context of the professional provision of 
payment services. 
 2. General observations  2.1 The ECB welcomes the draft emergency ordina nce which will comprehensively regulate payment 
transactions in Romania in accordance with Directive 2007/64/EC. While acknowledging the 
importance of Directive 2007/64/EC for the realisati on of the Single European Payments Area, in 
this opinion the ECB does not make a comprehensiv e assessment of the provisions of the draft 
                                                 
1 OJ L 189, 3.7.1998, p. 42.  
2 OJ L 319, 5.12.2007, p. 1. 
 
2                                                 em
ergency ordinance implementing Directive 2007/ 64/EC. Instead, this opinion only focuses on 
the provisions that go beyond such implementation and that relate to payment systems and BNR. 
2.2 The draft emergency ordinance only transposes Articles 1 to 4, 6, 7, 9 to 27, 29 to 88 and 93 of 
Directive 2007/64/EC. The ECB understands that the technical details concerning the licensing and 
supervision of payment institutions will be estab lished separately by BNR (see Article 186(1) of 
the draft emergency ordinance). 
2.3 The draft emergency ordinance extends BNR’s competence by giving it new tasks concerning the 
licensing and supervision of payment institutions (see,  in particular, Sections 1, 2 and 9 in Title II 
of the draft emergency ordinance). The ECB welcomes this widening of BNR’s competence in so far as, in accordance with the principle of centr al bank independence, BNR can independently avail 
itself of sufficient financial and personnel resources,  both in terms of quantity and quality, to carry 
out tasks related to the European System of Central Banks as well as its own tasks, including its new tasks based on the draft emergency ordinance
3. 
 
This opinion will be published on the ECB’s website.    Done at Frankfurt am Main, 15 September 2009. 
 
[signed] 
 
The President of the ECB 
Jean-Claude TRICHET 
 
3 See the ECB Convergence Report, May 2008, p. 20. See also Opinion CON/2009/ 27. All ECB opinions are published on 
the ECB website at www.ecb.europa.eu.