European Central Bank: New TARGET2 and Eurosystem guidelines

Two new Guidelines by the European Central Bank (ECB) have been published.

TARGET2

Annexes II, III and IV to Guideline ECB/2007/2 have been amended in accordance with the Annex to the Guideline of the European Central Bank ECB/2009/9 of 7 May 2009 amending Guideline ECB/2007/2 on a Trans-European Automated Real-time Gross Settlement Express Transfer system (TARGET2).

Guideline ECB/2009/9 was published in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) 19.5.2009 L 123/94.



***

Eurosystem

Amendments have been made to Guideline ECB/2000/7 of 31 August 2000 on monetary policy instruments and procedures of the Eurosystem to allow access to Eurosystem open market operations and standing facilities by credit institutions which, in view of their specific institutional nature under Community law, are subject to scrutiny of a standard comparable to supervision by competent national authorities.


The amendments are enacted by the Guideline of the European Central Bank ECB/2009/10 of 7 May 2009 amending Guideline ECB/2000/7 on monetary policy instruments and procedures of the Eurosystem, published OJEU 19.5.2009 L 123/99.



Ralf Grahn

ECB: TARGET2-Securities Programme Board

A further step on the road to an operational borderless pan-European cash and securities settlement system.

See the Decision of the European Central Bank ECB/2009/6 of 19 March 2009 on the establishment of the TARGET2-Securities Programme Board, which has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union (OJEU) 22.4.2009 L 102/12.



Article 1
T2S Programme Board

1. The T2S Programme Board shall be established as a streamlined management body of the Eurosystem with the task of developing proposals for the Governing Council on key strategic issues and executing tasks of a purely technical nature in relation to T2S.

2. The mandate of the T2S Programme Board, including its objectives, responsibilities, tasks, composition, working procedures, and budget, shall be as set out in the Annex to this Decision.

3. The names and resumés of candidates to be considered for appointment to the T2S Programme Board members shall be sent by members of the Governing Council to the Executive Board so that they are received no later than 8 April 2009. On the basis of such proposals, the Governing Council shall appoint members of the T2S Programme Board on 23 April 2009.

4. The T2S Programme Board shall commence work from mid-May 2009.

5. The T2S Programme Board shall communicate its agenda, a summary of its meetings and relevant documentation in relation to its meetings to the members of the PSSC to allow the latter to provide input to the T2S Programme Board.


***

TARGET2 – cash and securities settlement

The appointment of the TARGET2-Securities Programme Board is a further step to make the system operational:

At its meeting of 6 July 2006, the Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB) decided to explore, in cooperation with central securities depositories (CSDs) and other market participants, the possibility of setting up a new Eurosystem service for securities settlement, to be called TARGET2-Securities (T2S). As part of its tasks in accordance with Articles 17, 18 and 22 of the Statute of the ESCB, the Eurosystem envisages that T2S will be a service based on a single platform allowing for core, neutral and borderless pan-European cash and securities settlement, which will be offered to CSDs to enable them to provide their customers with harmonised and commoditised delivery-versus-payment settlement services in central bank money in an integrated technical environment.



Ralf Grahn