Decision of the European Central Bank of 24 July 2007 concerning the terms and conditions of TARGET2-ECB (ECB/2007/7) (2007/601/EC)

TITLE II PARTICIPATION

Article 4 Access criteria

Organisations providing clearing or settlement services (including entities established outside the EEA) that are subject to oversight by a competent authority and whose access to TARGET2-ECB has been approved by the Governing Council, shall be the only entities that are eligible for participation in TARGET2-ECB.

Article 5 Direct participants

Direct participants in TARGET2-ECB shall comply with the requirements set out in Article 6(1) and (2). They shall have at least one PM account with the ECB.

Article 6 Application procedure

1. To join TARGET2-ECB, applicant participants shall fulfil the following technical and legal requirements:

(a) install, manage, operate and monitor and ensure the security of the necessary IT infrastructure to connect to TARGET2-ECB and submit payment orders to it. In doing so, applicant participants may involve third parties, but retain sole liability. In particular, applicant participants shall enter into an agreement with the network service provider to obtain the necessary connection and admissions, in accordance with the technical specifications in Appendix I; and

(b) have passed the tests required by the ECB;

(c) provide a capacity opinion in the form specified in Appendix III, unless the information and representations to be provided in such capacity opinion have already been obtained by the ECB in another context; and

(d) for entities established outside the EEA, provide a country opinion in the form specified in Appendix III, unless the information and representations to be provided in such country opinion have already been obtained by the ECB in another context.

2. Applicants shall apply in writing to the ECB, as a minimum enclosing the following documents/information:

(a) completed static data collection forms as provided by the ECB,

(b) the capacity opinion, if required by the ECB, and

(c) the country opinion, if required by the ECB.

3. The ECB may also request any additional information it deems necessary to decide on the application to participate.

4. The ECB shall reject the application to participate if:

(a) access criteria referred to in Article 4 are not met;

(b) one or more of the participation criteria referred to in paragraph 1 are not met; and/or

(c) in the ECB's assessment, such participation would endanger the overall stability, soundness and safety of TARGET2-ECB or of any other TARGET2 component system, or would jeopardise the ECB's performance of its tasks as described in the Statute of the European System of Central Banks and of the European Central Bank.

5. The ECB shall communicate its decision on the application to participate to the applicant within one month of the ECB's receipt of the application to participate. Where the ECB requests additional information pursuant to paragraph 3, the decision shall be communicated within one month of the ECB's receipt of this information from the applicant. Any rejection decision shall contain reasons for the rejection.

Article 7 TARGET2 directory

1. The TARGET2 directory is the database of BICs used for the routing of payment orders addressed to:

(a) TARGET2 participants and their branches with multi-addressee access;

(b) indirect participants of TARGET2, including those with multi-addressee access; and

(c) addressable BIC holders of TARGET2.

It shall be updated weekly.

2. Unless otherwise requested by the participant, BICs shall be published in the TARGET2 directory.

3. Participants may only distribute the TARGET2 directory to their branches and entities with multi-addressee access.

4. Entities specified in paragraph 1(b) and (c) shall only use their BIC in relation to one direct participant.