Article

Public consultation on the draft regulation on the reporting of information duty by notaries, solicitors and lawyers to the Bank of Portugal

On the 28th of February, Banco de Portugal published Public Consultation No. 2/2022 on the draft of the regulation governing the duty of periodic reporting to Bank of Portugal by notaries, solicitors and lawyers (hereinafter "Draft Regulation").

The publication of the public consultation follows the approval and entry into force of Law No. 78/2021 of 24 November, which approves the legal framework for preventing and combating unauthorized financial activity and consumer protection. This regime provides for a set of duties, among which, directed to notaries, solicitors and lawyers, namely, the duty to report to the Bank of Portugal (hereinafter "BoP") information on public deeds, notarized private documents or documents with a notarized signature in which they intervene in the context of the following acts, with the exception of those in which they act on behalf of entities authorized by the financial supervisors (hereinafter "operations"):

i. loan agreements or statements of assumption or confession of debt;
ii. financial leasing contracts;
iii. restitutive leasing contracts;
iv. contracts for the purchase and sale of real estate associated with a lease to the seller or transfer of ownership to the original seller; and,
v. contracts for the purchase and sale of immovable property or movable property subject to registration which do not involve the granting of a loan by entities qualified to carry out credit activities, whenever the purchaser has already been the seller of the same property, or the lease or usufruct of the immovable property or the usufruct of the movable property by the seller is provided for, or the option to repurchase the property by the seller is provided for.

In accordance with article no. 4 (5) of Law no. 78/2021 these professionals must report electronically to the BoP as of March 1st.

To this end, this diploma assigns to the BoP the power to regulate how the registration, reporting and periodicity of this information is carried out.

Thus, the BoP has now published a draft regulation on how to comply with this duty. Specifically, it states that the duty to report must be done before the respective professional associations, which, in turn, will submit the information to the BoP. The reporting must be carried out by the end of the month in which the legal act subject to the report was performed, in Portuguese language.

The draft regulation under analysis is under public consultation until April 11. Its addressees may send their contributions by completing and submitting the excel file to the email address das.afi@bportugal.pt.

As already mentioned, the duty to report begins as from March 1st. Therefore, during the period of adaptation and implementation of the relevant reporting channel, notaries, lawyers and solicitors must submit the following information on the transactions in which they are involved to the channel reporte_lei78_2021@bportugal.pt:

- Identifying elements of the reporter;
- Identification of the counterparties in the transaction;
- Legal nature of the act performed;
- Date, place and value of the act performed.

This provisional reporting is done by completing the excel file and should be indicated in the subject the mention "Electronic Communication - Law No. 78/2021, November 24.

We also remind that as envisaged in the aforementioned law, the failure to comply with this duty may result in disciplinary or ethical sanctions by the competent professional associations.

To access the full version of the explanatory note to BdP Consultation No. 2/2022 and the BdP Draft Regulation, click here and here (in Portuguese version only).

For more information on this subject, please contact:
Miguel Silva Cordeiro,
Head of the Banking and Finance Department of CTSU
mcordeiro@ctsu.pt
 

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