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European Union jurisdictional rules
European Union jurisdictional rules
C
Written by Catarina Veloso
Updated over 2 months ago

These settings documented in this page reflect the rules applicable under the European Transfer of Funds Regulation. These rules currently apply to the following Member State jurisdictions in the system:

  1. Austria - AT

  2. Belgium - BE

  3. Bulgaria - BG

  4. Croatia - HR

  5. Cyprus - CY

  6. Czech Republic - CZ

  7. Denmark - DK

  8. Estonia - EE (enforced on 31th Dec 2024, here are current requirements)

  9. Finland - FI

  10. France - FR

  11. Germany - DE

  12. Greece - GR

  13. Hungary - HU

  14. Ireland - IE

  15. Italy - IT

  16. Latvia - LV

  17. Lithuania - LT

  18. Luxembourg - LU

  19. Netherlands - NL

  20. Poland - PL

  21. Portugal - PT

  22. Romania - RO

  23. Slovakia - SK

  24. Slovenia - SI

  25. Sweden - SE

  26. Malta - MT

  27. Spain - ES

These rules also apply to the following EEA jurisdictions:

  1. Norway - NO

  2. Iceland​ - IS

  3. Liechtenstein - LI

In the European Union, Travel Rule requirements are set forth in the Transfer of Funds Regulation (TFR), and further specified in the European Banking Authority (EBA) Travel Rule Guidelines ("Regulations").

Threshold

Amount

Currency

Source

N/A

N/A

N/A

Under the TFR, crypto asset transfers are always subject to the same scope of obligations. This means that the scope of information that needs to be transmitted does not vary depending on transaction amount or whether or not the transaction is cross-borders.

Required Originator and Beneficiary information vs Notabene system for natural person

Party to the TX

Required information (*)

IVMS field

Required? (**)

Originator

Name

name

Yes

Originator

Account number/ Distributed ledger address****

accountNumber

Yes

Originator

Address

geographicAddress

OR

Originator

Official personal document number

nationalIdentification

OR

Originator

Customer identification number

customerIdentification

OR

Originator

Date and place of birth

dateAndPlaceOfBirth

OR

Beneficiary

Name

name

Yes

Beneficiary

Account number/ Distributed ledger address****

accountNumber

Yes

Required Originator and Beneficiary information vs Notabene system for companies

Party to the TX

Required information (*)

IVMS field

Required?(**)

Originator

Registered name

name

Yes

Originator

Account number/ Distributed ledger address****

accountNumber

Yes

Originator

Registered office address

geographicAddress

OR

Originator

LEI or equivalent official identifier

nationalIdentification

OR

Originator

Customer identification number

customerIdentification

OR

Originator

Date and Place of Birth

dateOfRegistration countryOfRegistration

***

Beneficiary

Name

name

Yes

Beneficiary

Account number/ Distributed ledger address****

accountNumber

Yes

(*) According to Articles 14/1 and 14/2 of the TFR.

(**) YES = Required ; OR = Alternative fields

(***) Regarding the date and place of birth, the EBA does not clarify what would be required instead if the originator is a legal person. In some jurisdictions, VASPs are required to provide instead date and place of incorporation, but the requirement in the EU is not clear yet.

(****) In cases where a transfer of crypto-assets is registered on a network using DLT or similar technology

Please note:

For Registered Name, EBA makes it clear that CASPs must transmit the registered name of the originator customer and the Trade Name is only admissible if:

  • Technical limitations prevent transmission of registered name

  • Can unequivocally be traced back to the legal person and match official registries

For LEI or equivalent official identifier, the TFR gives preference to the transmission of the Legal Entity Identifier of the originator customer, but in its absence CASPs can also transmit equivalent official identifiers. The EBA guidelines set the criteria that must be met for an official identifier to be deemed equivalent to an LEI. Criteria for official identifier to be deemed equivalent to LEI is:

  • Single identification code that is unique to the legal entity

  • Published in public registries

  • Automatically issued upon incorporation by a public authority

  • Allow for identification of name and address

  • Accompanied by a description of the type of identifier in the messaging system

  • The system is set up in a way that allows each CASP to determine which of the fields flagged as OR in the table above should be transmitted. CASPs are able to successfully create and send Travel Rule transfers with only one of the fields flagged as OR in the table above, but may also decide to include additional fields if desired. The reasoning for this set-up is further explained below.

  • There is a degree of ambiguity regarding which details about the originating customer are mandatory and which are optional.

  • The TFR, in Article 14/1/d), provides that the CASP needs to provide the “originator’s address, [...] official personal document number and customer identification number, or, alternatively, the originator’s date and place of birth”.

  • From this provision, it is not clear whether the date and place of birth is an alternative to the customer identification number only (and, therefore, the address and ID number are mandatory fields) or if it is an alternative to all preceding data points (and, therefore, CASPs are able to transmit either the address OR the official personal document number OR the customer identification number OR the date and place of birth).

  • In paragraph 39, the EBA Travel Rule Guidelines set forth that “[t]he combination of the alternative information items to be provided in accordance with Article 4(1), point (c), and 14(1), point (d), of Regulation (EU) 2023/1113 should not only be based on availability but also on the set of information which best provides for an unambiguous identification of the payer or originator”.

  • The EBA further acknowledges that the TFR leaves space for interpretation and explains that the Travel Rule Guidelines intend to provide a more flexible approach better suited for cross-border transfers. The goals are to (i) submit complete information to fulfil the traceability purpose of the Travel Rule, (ii) allow for sufficient level of certainty in the identification of the originator, and (iii) enable proper fulfilment of screening requirements.

  • The guidelines provided by the EBA are intended to complement the TFR, not to clarify it. Thus, any ambiguities within the TFR are not resolved by these guidelines and must ultimately be addressed by the European legislator. We are aware that the EBA has already requested the legislator to clarify this ambiguity.

  • As explained above, Notabene has configured the system to allow the successful implementation of different interpretations of these requirements.

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