Opinion of the European Central Bank of 25 March 2013 on balance of payments reporting (CON/2013/22)
Date: 2013-03-25
Institutions: European Central Bank
Subjects: Austria, balance of payments, data collection, national law, statistics

EN 

ECB-PUBLIC 

OPINION OF THE EUROPEAN CENTRAL BANK 

of 25 March 2013 

on balance of payments reporting 

(CON/2013/22) 

Introduction and legal basis 

On  20  February  2013,  the  European  Central  Bank  (ECB)  received  a  request  from  the  Oesterreichische 

Nationalbank (OeNB) for an opinion on a draft regulation of the OeNB governing balance of payments 

reporting (hereinafter the ‘draft regulation’). 

The ECB’s competence to deliver an opinion is based on Article 127(4) and Article 282 (5) of the Treaty 

on the Functioning of the European Union as well as the third and fourth indent 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  provisions1,  as  the  draft  regulation  relates  to  the  OeNB  and  the 

collection of balance of payments statistics. 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 regulation 

1.1  Since  the  beginning  of  2006,  two  OeNB  balance of payments reporting  regulations  have  been in 
effect: ZABIL 1/20052, as amended by ZABIL 1/2009, governed the collection of statistical data 

required  for  compiling  current  accounts,  in  particular  data  on  cross-border  services.  Due  to 

international  standards  as  well  as  European  Union  and  ECB  requirements,  the  necessary 

adaptations  to  this  regulation  were  implemented  by  the  adoption  of  the  balance  of  payments 
regulation (ZABIL 1/2012), which entered into force on 1 January 20133. 

1.2  The  second  reporting  regulation,  ZABIL  1/2004,  as  amended  by  ZABIL  2/20094,  governs  the 

collection of statistical data for financial accounts, in particular data on a security-by-security basis, 

direct investments, cross-border loans and deposits of non-banks. The draft regulation shall replace 

ZABIL  1/2004,  as  amended.  The  replacement  of  this  regulation  is  necessary  due  to  new 

international standards, namely the sixth edition of the International Monetary Fund’s Balance of 

Payments and International Investment Position Manual, and new Union legal requirements based 

thereon.  The  Union  legal  requirements  include  in  particular  Guideline  ECB/2011/23  of 

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OJ L 189, 3.7.1998, p. 42. 
See Opinion CON/2005/23. 
See Opinion CON/2012/67. 
See Opinion CON/2004/26. 

 
 
 
 
                                                 
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9 December 2011  on  the  statistical  reporting  requirements  of  the  European  Central  Bank  in  the 
field  of  external  statistics5  and  Commission  Regulation  (EU)  No  555/2012  of  22  June  2012 

amending  Regulation (EC)  No  184/2005  of  the  European  Parliament  and  of  the  Council  on 

Community  statistics  concerning  balance of payments,  international  trade  in  services  and  foreign 
direct investment, as regards the update of data requirements and definitions6. The draft regulation 

also implements Article 6 of the Exchange Control Act 2004, under which the OeNB is responsible 

for compiling the Austrian balance of payments, international investment position statistics, direct 

investment  statistics  and  all  statistics  regarding  cross-border  transactions  and  positions  in  the 

context of the abovementioned statistics, based on Union regulations. 

2.  General observation  

In accordance with Article 14.3 of the Statute of the European System of Central Banks and the European 

Central Bank (hereinafter the ‘Statute of the ESCB’), national central banks must act in accordance with 

the  guidelines  of  the  ECB.  The  ECB  generally  welcomes  the  draft  regulation,  which  will  ensure 

consistency with the reporting requirements under Guideline ECB/2011/23 following the basic principles 
of  the  ECB  Statistics  Quality  Framework7.  The  main  purpose  of  euro  area  balance  of  payments  and 

international investment position statistics is to support the ECB’s monetary policy and other Eurosystem 
tasks. Moreover, as stated in the Eurosystem’s mission statement8, accountability, transparency and good 

governance are important values supporting the integrity of the statistical functions defined by Article 5 

of the Statute of the ESCB. 

3. 

Specific observations 

3.1  Electronic reporting 

The  ECB  welcomes  the  OeNB’s  emphasis  on  the  greater  use  of electronic reporting  as  the  main 

channel  for  data  transmission,  as  this  could  assist  in  the  provision  of  more  timely  and  accurate 

reporting. 

3.2  Reporting thresholds 

The  ECB  accepts  that,  for  the  purpose  of  reducing  the  collection  burden  on  reporting  agents,  an 

increase in the reporting thresholds, as specified below, is envisaged. 

(a) 

For  data  on  end-month  stocks  of  cross-border  loans,  trade  credit  and  deposits  and  for  all 

investment  categories,  the  threshold  is  raised  to  EUR 10  million  (formerly  EUR 3  million 

and EUR 5 million, respectively). 

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8  

OJ L 65, 3.3.2012, p. 1. 
OJ L 166, 27.6.2012, p. 22. 
Available on the ECB’s website at www.ecb.europa.eu. 
Available on the ECB’s website at www.ecb.europa.eu. 

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(b) 

For data on direct investment transactions, the threshold is raised to EUR 500 000 (formerly 

EUR 100 000) per transaction; additionally, the reporting deadline is brought forward by five 

days. 

(c) 

For data on quarterly stocks of claims and liabilities under cross-border financial derivatives, 

the threshold is raised to EUR 5 million (formerly EUR 1 million). 

Furthermore, the ECB understands that intermediary measures, such as estimates and recourse to 

secondary  sources,  may  become  necessary  to  fill  the  gaps  arising  from  the  increased  thresholds. 

Nevertheless this would still result in freeing up resources which can be used to improve the quality 

of data reported by statistically significant reporting agents. 

3.3  Direct investment transactions 

For data on direct investment transactions, the ECB welcomes the introduction of additional data 

collection categories and changes to the reporting period, as set out below: 

(a)  The  inclusion  of  two  new  indicators,  namely  to  differentiate  between  ‘purchase  of  shares’ 

and  ‘sales  of  shares’  could  enable  improved  data  analysis,  particularly  for  Foreign  Direct 

Investment (FDI) purposes. 

(b)  The mandatory disclosure of the tax ID or commercial register number will facilitate faster 

and  unambiguous 

identification  of 

foreign 

(i.e.  non-resident)  direct 

investment 

enterprises/direct  investors,  which  are  located  in  the  EEA  and  Switzerland.  This  is 

particularly  important  from  the  perspective  of  the  joint  ECB/Eurostat  project  on  the  FDI 

Network,  which  aims  to  harmonise  and  improve  statistics  on  FDI.  Moreover,  the  ECB 

invites the OeNB to closely monitor the developments in the Global Legal Entity Identifier 
(LEI) Initiative9. 

(c)  The change of the report submission deadline to five days earlier, i.e. the 15th calendar day of 

the month following the reporting period, could ensure more timely availability of data for 

the OeNB’s and ECB’s monthly data analysis production rounds. 

3.4  Portfolio investment transactions 

With  respect  to  data  on  portfolio investment transactions, the  ECB  welcomes  the  introduction  of 

new data collection categories, as outlined below: 

(a)  Extension of the existing reports on securities by custodians in the context of breakdowns of 

customer  accounts  by  report  category,  i.e.  by  adding  (i)  the  country  of  residence  of  the 

account  holder,  (ii)  changes  in  the  definitions  of  the  reporting  categories,  and  (iii)  a  new 

category of non-resident public entities. In addition, the following will be collected: (i) new 

mandatory items for stating the market value, (ii) a value field for short positions, and (iii) a 

field for the  nominal currency  of  banks’ and customers’ stocks.  However,  the  reporting  of 

data on securities prices will be discontinued. 

9   

Financial Stability Board reports on the LEI: 
http://www.financialstabilityboard.org/list/fsb_publications/tid_156/index.htm  

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(b)  New  annual  account  holder  reports  by  custodian  banks  will  be  included  in  the  reporting 

framework. 

The  collection  of  additional  information,  as  above,  could  support  compliance  with  the  updated 

European  System  of  Accounts  (ESA  2010)  as  well  as  with  any  potential  future  requirements  for 

extended  institutional  sector  breakdowns  in  the  balance  of  payments  reporting  framework. 

Furthermore,  the  additional  variables  could  enable  better  facilities  for  data  analysis  and  quality 

checking. 

3.5  Other investment transactions 

With  respect  to  data  on  other  investment  transactions,  the  ECB  welcomes  the  introduction  of  a 

separate category for participations of less than 10 % in other enterprises, which could assist in the 

compilation of the new ‘Other Equity’ item in the other investments account. 

This opinion will be published on the ECB’s website. 

Done at Frankfurt am Main, 25 March 2013. 

[signed] 

The Vice-President of the ECB 

Vítor CONSTÂNCIO 

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