On 3 and 4 August 2021, Boyko Atanasov, Chairman of the Financial Supervision Commission, launched a series of training seminars for supervised entities on topics related to the implementation of measures to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing provided for in the Law on Measures against Money Laundering, the Law on Measures against Financing of Terrorism and the acts on their implementation.

The main topics of the online training seminars were:

– Evaluation of the Republic of Bulgaria within the Fifth Evaluation Round of the MONEYVAL Committee of the Council of Europe;

– National risk assessment of money laundering and terrorist financing in the Republic of Bulgaria;

– Preparation of own risk assessment by the obligated persons and determination of the risk profile of their clients;

– Requirements for remote identification of customers;

– Requirements of the Law on Measures against Financing of Terrorism;

– Established trends and typologies for money laundering and terrorist financing and predicate offenses at the national and international level;

– Practices and trends identified among obligated parties in the Commission’s oversight of the implementation of the Law on Measures against Money Laundering, the Regulations for the Implementation of the Law on Measures against Money Laundering, and the Law on Measures against Financing of Terrorism.

During the trainings the experts of the Financial Supervision Commission provided an opportunity to discuss certain issues related to the application of the considered regulatory acts, set by the participants.

The topics of the training seminars were the subject of increased interest among business representatives.

The training held on 3 August 2021 was attended by 190 representatives and employees of a total of 62 companies – investment firms, collective investment schemes and other collective investment undertakings, management companies and managers of alternative investment funds.

The training held on 4 August 2021 was attended by 138 representatives and employees of a total of 75 pension insurance companies, insurers and insurance intermediaries.

The purpose of the seminars is to further the understanding of the representatives of the non-banking financial sector of the importance of compliance with the requirements of preventive legislation and their key role in maintaining the stability of the financial sector and assisting the competent authorities in preventing and detecting money laundering and terrorist financing activities.

The Financial Supervision Commission (FSC) has been notified by the competent authority of the Republic of Ireland (Central Bank of Ireland) of the forthcoming portfolio transfer from the insurance undertaking Aetna Health Insurance Company of Europe Designated Activity Company to AWL Health & Life, including insurance contracts on which the Republic of Bulgaria is a Member State where the risk is located. After reviewing the portfolio documents, the FSC decided to send a letter to the national competent authority of the Republic of Ireland on granting consent for the transfer of the insurance portfolio from the Aetna Health Insurance Company of Europe Designated Activity Company to AWL Health & Life.

“Against the background of rapid development of digital technologies and their application in financial services, the Financial Supervision Commission adopted a Strategy for Monitoring Financial Innovations in the Non-Banking Financial Sector for the period 2021-2024. It is also a logical response to the growing need for an adequate legal framework, as well as a basis for building a stable financial environment.”- said in the presentation of the Strategy Boyko Atanasov, Chairman of the FSC.

In the adopted Strategy, the Financial Supervision Commission focuses on four main objectives to address: analysis of the need to introduce requirements for licensing or registration regime of persons offering innovative financial products and / or services and technologies to the non-banking financial sector, as well as development of specific requirements, analysis of the need for regulatory framework for outsourcing services, incl. cloud services and taking appropriate regulatory measures to ensure security, stability of the financial services market and protection of consumers of financial services, development of the existing innovation hub and last but not least monitoring the development of sandbox regimes and outlining follow-up with its possible implementation by the regulator.

According to Mr. Boyko Atanasov, Chairman of the FSC, the Strategy for Monitoring the Financial Innovations of the FSC for the period 2021-2024 continues, but also builds on the tradition of the previous strategy, outlining in the long run the directions in which the FSC would be committed to developing its supervisory activities and seeking the harmonization of national regulatory frameworks and practices in the field of financial innovation at European Union level.

A seminar with a target group of persons supervised by the FSC is forthcoming, and the topics are related to the application of the LMML, the LMFT and the acts on their implementation.

The Financial Supervision Commission (FSC) plans to organize and conduct an online training seminar for entities supervised by the FSC on topics related to the implementation of measures to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing provided for in the Law on Measures against Money Laundering (LMML), the Law on Measures against Financing of Terrorism (LMFT) and the acts on their implementation, as well as the identified risks of money laundering and terrorist financing, published in the National AML/CFT Risk Assessment published on 19.01.2020 in the Republic of Bulgaria. Issues related to the forthcoming evaluation visit related to the evaluation of the Republic of Bulgaria within the Fifth Evaluation Round of the Committee of Experts on the Evaluation of Anti-Money Laundering Measures and the Financing of Terrorism at the Council of Europe (MONEYVAL) will also be discussed.

The seminar will be opened by Boyko Atanasov, Chairman of the FSC and will be held on 26 August 2021 /Thursday/, from 10:00 to 15:30, through the Microsoft Teams platform, for the following supervised persons:

 investment intermediaries (obligated persons under Art. 4, item 8 of the LMML);

 collective investment schemes and other collective investment undertakings (obligated persons under Art. 4, item 9 of the LMML);

 management companies and persons managing alternative investment funds (obligated persons under Art. 4, item 10 of the LMML);

 pension insurance companies (obligated persons under Art. 4, item 11 of the LMML);

 insurers and insurance intermediaries based in the Republic of Bulgaria who have received a license under the terms and conditions of the Insurance Code when operating in one or more of the classes of insurance under Section I of Appendix No. 1 to the Insurance Code (obligated persons under Art. 4, item 5 of the LMML);

 insurers and insurance intermediaries licensed in another Member State operating on the territory of the Republic of Bulgaria when operating under one or more of the classes of insurance under Section I of Appendix No. 1 to the Insurance Code (obligated persons under Art. 4, item 5 of the LMML);

 insurers based in countries other than a Member State licensed by the Financial Supervision Commission to operate in the Republic of Bulgaria through a branch when operating in one or more of the classes of insurance under Section I of Appendix No. 1 to the Insurance Code (obligated persons under Article 4, item 5 of the LMML).

You can confirm your participation by e-mail: lenkova_rd@fsc.bg, no later than 25.08.2021 /Wednesday/ until 12:00.

After confirming your participation you will receive a link to the event.

The Financial Supervision Commission considered and adopted at the first vote amendments to Ordinance No. 52 of 21.10.2016 on the procedure and manner of deducting the investment fee collected by pension insurance companies in the management of supplementary mandatory pension insurance funds They are dictated by adopted amendments to Art. 201, para. 1, item 3 and para. 2 of the Social Insurance Code (promulgated, SG, 19 /05.03.2021), which introduced a fee collected by the pension insurance companies in the management of the payment funds. The amendments to the ordinance are intended to regulate the procedure for deducting the fee calculated on the net asset value of the payment funds collected by the pension insurance companies in the management of these funds.

The draft and the reasons for it are published on the website of the Financial Supervision Commission in the section Regulations, subsection Public Consultations, and the deadline for submitting comments and proposals on the draft is 14 days from its publication until 22.06.2021 inclusive.

The Financial Supervision Commission considered and adopted at the first vote a draft Ordinance amending Ordinance No. 63 of 8 November 2018 on the requirements for the content, periodicity of preparation and deadlines for submission of reports for supervisory purposes of pension insurance companies and the funds managed by them. The project aims to comply with the amendments made to the Act to Amend and Supplement the Social Insurance Code (promulgated SG No. 19/2021).

Art. 185 of the Social Insurance Code stipulates that the requirements for the content, periodicity of preparation and deadlines for submission of reports for supervisory purposes of the payment funds are regulated by an ordinance of the Financial Supervision Commission (FSC). In this regard, the draft ordinance provides for the creation of templates of monthly and annual reports for the payments funds of lifelong pensions and the payment funds, which are submitted to the FSC. The reports are expected to be submitted within the same deadlines as the reports for supervisory purposes of the pension insurance companies and the supplementary pension funds. The adopted approach is to present the reports to the supervisory body in electronic form, signed with a qualified electronic signature, through an electronic portal maintained by the FSC. In accordance with the amendments to the SIC, the current models of reports for supervisory purposes have been updated.

The draft and the reasons for it are published on the website of the Financial Supervision Commission in the section Regulations, subsection Public Consultations, and the deadline for submitting comments and proposals on the draft is 14 days from its publication until 29.06.2021 inclusive.

The Financial Supervision Commission considered and adopted at the first vote a draft Ordinance to amend and supplement Ordinance No. 31 of 02.08.2006 on the terms and procedure for conducting an examination and for recognizing the legal capacity of a responsible actuary, for recognizing the legal capacity acquired outside the Republic of Bulgaria, for the form of the actuarial certification, the form and content of the actuarial report and the references under the Insurance Code which the responsible actuary certifies, as well as for the form and mandatory content of the annual actuarial report under the Social Insurance Code, in order to bring it in line with the changes made with the Act to Amend and Supplement the Social Insurance Code (promulgated SG No. 19/2021).

The ordinance updates the requirements to the annual actuarial report for each supplementary pension fund and its annexes in view of the changes in the legal level, providing for the payment of supplementary lifelong old-age pensions and deferred payments in case of acquired pension rights to be made by separate payment funds, not from universal pension funds. In connection with the establishment of the funds for payment of lifelong pensions and the funds for deferred payments, the obligatory content of the actuarial reports prepared for these funds is regulated. This provides the necessary information on the state of the payment funds and ensures their proper functioning to meet the obligations to pensioners, persons receiving deferred payments and their heirs and the supervision of this activity.

The draft and the reasons for it are published on the website of the Financial Supervision Commission in the section Regulations, subsection Public Consultations, and the deadline for submitting comments and proposals on the draft is 14 days from its publication until 29.06.2021 inclusive.

The Financial Supervision Commission considered and adopted at the first vote a draft Ordinance on the requirements for payment funds.

The Act to Amend and Supplement the Social Insurance Code (promulgated SG No. 19/2021) stipulates that the payment of pensions and deferred payments in case of acquired pension rights from universal pension funds is carried out by the funds for payment of lifelong pensions, respectively the funds for deferred payments (payment funds). The requirements for the formation and maintenance of the funds for payment of lifelong pensions and the funds for deferred payments, the calculation of the required amount in them and its excess, the supplementation of the funds and the release of funds from them are determined by an ordinance of the Financial Supervision Commission.

According to the Social Insurance Code, the main source for the formation of funds for payments are the funds in the individual accounts of the persons insured in a universal pension fund, with whom pension contracts, respectively contracts for deferred payment have been concluded. In view of the daily calculation of the value of one unit in the universal pension fund and in order to avoid a difference between the receipts in the payment funds and the obligations arising from the concluded pension contracts and deferred payment contracts, the ordinance stipulates that as a rule the accounts of the persons concluding such contracts shall be transferred to the payment funds on the day of concluding the respective contract. In order to provide sufficient time for the transfer of funds, it is possible to perform this action on the first working day after the conclusion of the contract by accruing the obligation on the day of the contract.

The law also gives the right to pensioners and persons with deferred payments to request recalculation of the received pension or deferred payment with contributions received after the conclusion of the respective contract, e.g. if the person has continued to work or as a result of the late transfer of contributions for previous months. In these cases, the transfer of funds from the accounts is made on the date provided by the legislator – the first day of the month following the month of submission of the request for recalculation, respectively on the first working day when it is a non-working day.

The ordinance regulates the required amount of the payment funds, amounting to the obligations to pensioners, the persons with deferred payments and their heirs, including the respective analytical account for the undistributed investment income of the funds received in the funds from individual accounts, intended for storage of the amount of payments in case of failure to achieve the expected return. According to the financial and economic nature and property nature of an analytical account provided for in the Social Insurance Code, the ordinance stipulates that a resource (funds) will be available for the amount / value reflected in the account, which should not be used for purposes other than updating of payments and which does not materialize financial legal relations with the pension insurance company. In other words, this account should be used to set aside funds that can be used specifically for the purpose of updating payments, and these funds do not have a functional link with the pension insurance company.

The ordinance also stipulates the deadlines for supplementing the funds for making payments, which is done from the reserves provided by law and, if necessary, with additional own funds of the pension insurance company, and the release of the excess from them. The procedure for release of funds regulated by the draft is in line with the procedure for the reserves for minimum profitability in the funds for supplementary mandatory pension insurance and the reserves for guaranteeing the gross amount of contributions to the universal pension funds.

The ordinance envisages changes in other current ordinances of the Financial Supervision Commission, which aim to harmonize and synchronize the regulations with the Social Insurance Code.

The draft and the reasons for it are published on the website of the Financial Supervision Commission in the section Regulations, subsection Public Consultations, and the deadline for submitting comments and proposals on the draft is 14 days from its publication until 24.06.2021 inclusive.