Regarding a received signal and in order to inform investors in financial instruments and all other participants in the capital markets, the Financial Supervision Commission informs the public that investment firm VARCHEV FINANCE EOOD, the related legal entities and the website used by the investment firm https://www.varchev.com/, on the one hand, and the persons providing loans under the name “Vranchev Finance” and using the website https://vranchev-finans.com, on the other hand, have no connection whatsoever.

 Vranchev Finance does not have a license from the FSC to provide investment services and perform investment activities within the meaning of Art. 6, para. 2 and 3 of the Markets in Financial Instruments Act, nor did the FSC receive notifications for Vranchev Finance or the website https://vranchev-finans.com from another national competent authority of a Member State for the provision of services in the Republic of Bulgaria under the freedom to provide services within the European Union or by establishing a branch. Therefore, according to Art. 7, para. 1 of the MFIA, Vranchev Finance has no right to provide investment services and / or perform investment activities within the meaning of Art. 6, para. 2 and 3 of the MFIA on the territory of the Republic of Bulgaria and the European Union, including to accept funds in its bank accounts on the occasion and / or for the purpose of any investment activity.

 Licensed companies can be verified on the FSC webpage – http://www.fsc.bg/ and / or on the webpages of the competent authorities of the European Union, as well as on the website of the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) – https://www.esma.europa.eu/.

The Financial Supervision Commission (FSC) presented publicly the project:

“Establishment of a Single Information System (UIS) for the Financial Supervision Commission”.

The project is implemented under administrative contract No. BG05SFOP001-1.011-0001-C01 / 23.07.2020 for the provision of grants under the Operational Program “Good Governance” (OPGG), co-financed by the European Union through the European Social Fund under the procedure BG05SFOP001-1.011 by directly providing a grant concluded between the OPGG Managing Authority and the Financial Supervision Commission.

The UIS was presented by Ms. Denitsa Kirova – Secretary General of the FSC and contracting authority of the project, who shared with the participants that “It is a priority for the Commission to reduce administrative burden by fully digitalizing the administrative services it offers. One of our key goals is to provide timely, good and transparent supervision activities. We live in two working worlds – real and virtual. We are aware of the need to be fully present where business and consumers are. I believe that building a unified information system will allow us to meet this need, and we will have the opportunity not only to improve the process of administrative services to citizens and businesses, but also to integrate the activities and processes of the FSC with the systems of European supervisors.

The main goals of the project “Establishment of a Single Information System (UIS) for the Financial Supervision Commission are:

Improving the process of administrative services to citizens and businesses by upgrading all administrative services that the FSC offers and are part of the state administration system (IISSA or Administrative Register).

Redesign, upgrade and improvement of at least 18 public registers of the FSC, through which information is provided to citizens and businesses.

Integration with the relevant horizontal components of e-government in the Republic of Bulgaria, as well as with the Single Portal for access to e-services.

Real-time integration of information exchange with EU regulators – the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA) and the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) .

Improving the mechanism for risk-based supervision applied by the FSC.

Refining and development of automation of the process of determining fees due by businesses and citizens.

Organizing and conducting trainings with the widest range of users, both by system administrators and end users.

The project will contribute to achieving the main objectives arising from the Updated e-Government Strategy in the Republic of Bulgaria for the period 2019 – 2023. It will finance activities necessary for the implementation of one of the priority measures in the Updated Roadmap for the implementation of the Updated Strategy for the development of e-government in the Republic of Bulgaria for the period 2019-2023, namely: design, development, implementation and maintenance of the Unified Information System of the Financial Supervision Commission.

The total value of the project is BGN 4,999,980.50. (four million nine hundred ninety-nine thousand nine hundred and eighty BGN and fifty stotinki), of which BGN 4,249,983.42 are European and BGN 749,997.08 are national co-financing.

The deadline for the establishment of the Unified Information System for the needs of the Financial Supervision Commission is set for the autumn of 2023.

The event itself took place online through the MS Teams platform, which was introduced as part of the Commission’s telecommuting measures at the beginning of last year’s epidemic.

The European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA) is conducting a survey on the attitudes of potential European suppliers towards the supply of savings products. The aim is to collect the maximum amount of data and information available on the Pan-European Personal Pension Product (PEPP).

Regulation (EU) 2019/1238 on a pan-European personal pension product (PERP Regulation) was adopted in July 2019 and has been effective since August 2020. The publication in the Official Journal of the EU on 22.03.2021 of a Delegated Regulation (EU) 2021/473 to supplement the PEPP Regulation also sets a date of 22.03.2022 from which it will apply. With this decision, the European Commission provides an opportunity for EU citizens to save for their future retirement through a safe, transparent and high-quality pension product.

The link where the survey can be found is:

https://ec.europa.eu/eusurvey/runner/PEPP_survey, the latter being active until 31 May 2021.

The presented final data on the value and number of paid and filed claims under Motor Third Party Liability Insurance, including by risk groups, as of 31.03.2021 are published on the FSC website – www.fsc.bg, section „Insurance activity”, “Statistics”, “Non-life Insurance”, “2020”. The data do not include insurance contracts that are concluded by insurers under the right of establishment or under the terms of freedom to provide services.

On 15 and 16 April 2021, the next module of the FIN-TECH project of the University of Economics – Varna was launched, funded by the Horizon 2020 program of the European Commission. The online session was attended by experts from the Financial Supervision Commission, the University of Economics – Varna, the Bulgarian Fintech Association and representatives of fintech companies in Bulgaria.

Within the two days of the training, the Bulgarian fintech ecosystem was discussed, as well as real cases of using blockchain in fintech, cyber risk management through models based on rank scale and explicable artificial intelligence, smart contracts – management, opportunities and risks , the cryptocurrency market and methods for its analysis by applying various cluster techniques based on prototypes, etc.

The event is held within the project FIN-TECH “A FINancial supervision and TECHnology compliance training program”, funded by HORIZON 2020, in which the University of Economics – Varna and the Financial Supervision Commission represent Bulgaria in a consortium of 24 countries. Each of them is presented by an educational institution in the field of higher education and a regulatory body for the non-banking sector.

Since the start of the project, in early 2019, the experts of the FSC and the University of Economics – Varna participated in two more sessions for knowledge exchange in the fields of big data and artificial intelligence. The University of Economics – Varna and the FSC jointly organized and held an International Round Table “Peer to peer lending in Europe and the Balkan Peninsula”.

The Financial Supervision Commission is actively continuing to study the implementation of financial innovations in the non-banking financial sector.