Eligible assets

All Eurosystem credit operations (i.e. liquidity-providing operations) must be based on adequate collateral. The Eurosystem accepts a wide range of assets, which fulfil certain eligibility criteria, to guarantee its operations.

The Eurosystem accepts two types of assets – marketable assets and non-marketable assets. The eligibility criteria for the two asset classes are uniform across the euro area. To ensure that the two asset classes comply with the same credit standards, a Eurosystem credit assessment framework (ECAF) has been set up, which relies on different credit assessment sources. No distinction is made between the two asset classes with regard to the quality of the assets and their eligibility for the various types of Eurosystem monetary policy operations, except that non-marketable assets are not used by the Eurosystem for outright transactions. The assets eligible for Eurosystem monetary policy operations may also be used to guarantee intraday credit. Furthermore, Eurosystem’s counterparties may use eligible assets on a cross-border basis, i.e. they may borrow from the central bank of the Member State in which they are established by making use of assets that can be settled in any Securities Settlement System considered eligible by the Eurosystem for that purpose.

All eligible assets are subject to risk control measures in order to protect the Eurosystem against the risk of financial loss if these assets have to be realised owing to the default of a counterparty. Counterparties shall not submit as collateral debt instruments issued or guaranteed by the counterparty, or by any other entity with which the counterparty has close links.

Market participants will be informed whenever revisions of the eligibility rules occur in order to allow for the timely implementation of the needed operational changes (see ECB Press Releases). Further information can be found in the document “The Implementation of Monetary Policy in the Euro Area” and in Instructions N.º 1/99 and N.º 19/2008 of the Banco de Portugal. For the full list of eligible assets please refer to the ECB’s website.

For information on the operational and legal aspects concerning the cross border use by Portuguese counterparties of credit claims governed by the Law of other Euro area countries please refer to the ECB’s website.

For further information on the operational and legal aspects concerning the cross border use by non-Portuguese counterparties of credit claims governed by the Portuguese Law please see the following documents: “Operational aspects for the cross border use of credit claims when Banco de Portugal is acting as CCB”, “Terms and conditions of Banco de Portugal when acting as CCB and as assisting NCB for credit claims”.

To submit questions related to eligible assets, please use the following e-mail address: Collateral.Management.Helpdesk@bportugal.pt