Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2017/394 of 11 November 2016 laying down implementing technical standards with regard to standard forms, templates and procedures for authorisation, review and evaluation of central securities depositories, for the cooperation between authorities of the home Member State and the host Member State, for the consultation of authorities involved in the authorisation to provide banking-type ancillary services, for access involving central securities depositories, and with regard to the format of the records to be maintained by central securities depositories in accordance with Regulation (EU) No 909/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council (Text with EEA relevance. )

THE EUROPEAN COMMISSION,

Having regard to the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union,

Having regard to Regulation (EU) No 909/2014 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 23 July 2014 on improving securities settlement in the European Union and on central securities depositories and amending Directives 98/26/EC and 2014/65/EU and Regulation (EU) No 236/2012⁽¹⁾, and in particular Article 17(10), Article 22(11), Article 24(8), Article 29(4), Article 33(6), Article 49(6), Article 52(4), Article 53(5) and Article 55(8) thereof,

Whereas:

1. The provisions in this Regulation are closely linked, since they all deal with supervisory requirements involving central securities depositories (CSDs). To ensure coherence between those provisions, and to facilitate a comprehensive view and compact access to them by persons subject to those obligations, it is desirable to include all the implementing technical standards required by Article 17(10), Article 22(11), Article 24(8), Article 29(4), Article 33(6), Article 49(6), Article 52(4), Article 53(5) and Article 55(8) of Regulation (EU) No 909/2014 in a single Regulation.

2. Any information submitted to the competent authority in a CSD's application for authorisation as well as for the purposes of review and evaluation should be provided in a durable medium.

3. In order to facilitate quick identification of the information submitted by a CSD, all documents provided to the competent authority, including those provided with an application for authorisation, should bear a unique reference number. Information submitted as part of the process of review and evaluation of the CSDs' activities should contain precise indications of the changes to the documents that have been submitted during that process.

4. In order to facilitate the cooperation between authorities where CSDs provide cross-border activities or set up branches, it is necessary to provide for harmonised standards, forms and procedures for such cooperation.

5. To carry out their duties effectively and consistently, the authorities authorised to have access to the records of CSDs in accordance with Regulation (EU) No 909/2014 should be provided with data that is comparable across CSDs. In addition, the use of common formats across different financial market infrastructures should facilitate the greater use of those formats by a wide variety of market participants, thus promoting standardisation. Standardised procedures and data formats across CSDs should reduce as well the costs for market participants and facilitate the tasks of supervisors and regulators.

6. To ensure consistency of the record keeping, all legal entities that use the services of a CSD should be identified by a unique code through the use of legal entity identifiers (LEI). The use of an LEI is already required under Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) No 1247/2012⁽²⁾ and it should be required for the purposes of the record keeping by CSDs. The use of proprietary formats by CSDs should be limited to internal processes, but for reporting purposes and for providing information to competent authorities any internal code should be appropriately converted into a globally accepted standard such as LEI. Account holders that are not participants in the securities settlement systems operated by CSDs, for instance in the case of direct securities holding systems, and clients of participants in the securities settlement systems operated by CSDs should be allowed to continue to be identified by national identifiers where available.

7. In order to ensure a harmonised approach regarding the processing of complaints concerning the access of participants to CSDs, the access of issuers to CSDs, the access between CSDs, and the access between a CSD and another market infrastructure, standard forms and templates should be used, specifying the identified risks and the assessment of the identified risks that justify a refusal of access.

8. In order to facilitate the consultation by the competent authority of a CSD with other authorities involved referred to in Regulation (EU) No 909/2014 prior to granting or refusing authorisation to provide banking-type ancillary services, it is necessary to provide for an effective and structured process for consultation. To facilitate the timely cooperation of the authorities concerned and allow each of them to provide a reasoned opinion concerning the application, the documents and data attached to an application should be organised according to common templates.

9. With a view to ensuring legal certainty and a consistent application of the law, certain requirements provided for in this Regulation concerning settlement discipline measures should start to apply from the date of entry into force of those measures.

10. This Regulation is based on the draft implementing technical standards submitted by the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) to the Commission.

11. In accordance with Regulation (EU) No 909/2014, in developing the draft implementing technical standards on which this Regulation is based, ESMA has worked in close cooperation with the members of the European System of Central Banks (ESCB). In accordance with Article 15 of Regulation (EU) No 1095/2010 of the European Parliament and of the Council⁽³⁾, ESMA has conducted open public consultations before submitting the draft implementing technical standards on which this Regulation is based, analysed the potential related costs and benefits and requested the opinion of the Securities and Markets Stakeholder Group established in accordance with Article 37 of Regulation (EU) No 1095/2010,

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