NSD and BCSE start cooperation on maintaining identifiers for legal entities.
Belarusian Currency and Stock Exchange (BCSE) became the first company to enter into an agreement with the National Settlement Depository (NSD) on performing the Register Agent functions, and was licensed by the Global Center for Legal Entity Identification System (GLEIF).
From now on, Belarusian stock market participants will be able to apply for NSD’s services for the assignment and maintenance of LEI (legal entity identification code) through a local Registration Agent. The BCSE will collect and verify a package of clients’ documents, provide them with information support and assistance in performing formal procedures, and submit reports to NSD.
The presence of LEIs and verified information about Belarusian companies in the global GLEIF database will increase the investment attractiveness of securities of issuers of the Republic of Belarus.
For NSD, this is the first experience of interacting with foreign clients when providing the services of the Local Operating Unit (LOU) using the Registration Agent resource.
The Registered Agent role is defined by GLEIF regulations. The Agent does not assign or maintain LEIs. Its task is to simplify the access to LOU services for market participants.
NSD is the first company in Russia and the CIS countries to receive the status of a Local Operating Unit.
As noted by Andrey Aukhimenia, Chairman of the Board of the BCSE, “this project has become a natural stage in the development of mutually beneficial cooperation between the Moscow Exchange Group and the BCSE. Obtaining the Registered Agent status allowed BCSE to form the necessary regulatory and technical base in the shortest possible time, to provide Belarusian companies with services for obtaining and maintaining LEIs supported by NSD technologies. This is another step to the systematic formation of the financial market infrastructure in the Republic of Belarus that meets international standards.” He also stressed that this format of interaction between the BCSE and NSD may be useful to other members of the International Association of Exchanges of the CIS countries, potentially interested in providing a similar range of services.
Tatyana Trostyanitskaya, Director of the NSD Securities Department, noted that interacting with foreign clients through a Registration Agent developed by NSD in response to the growing demand from clients from the CIS countries will simplify and accelerate access to NSD’s services for assigning and maintaining LEIs. The pandemic that changed many business processes contributed to the introduction of optimal ways of communicating with foreign customers without losing the quality of service.
