Public quasi-corporations as AnaCredit debtors
Public quasi-corporations that are counterparties to reportable instruments must be reported as distinct debtors under AnaCredit.
Question
In some jurisdictions, government-controlled market-producing units operate without separate legal status. Such entities may constitute public quasi-corporations within the meaning of ESA 2010 and may include, for example, municipal utilities, local public transport operators, water supply services, waste management services or forestry activities organised directly within a government unit.
Because such entities may not constitute separate legal entities under national law, reporting institutions may consider credit granted to them as credit granted directly to the respective (e.g. regional or central) government authority that owns and operates them.
Against this background, could you clarify whether for AnaCredit purposes a reportable instrument granted to a public quasi-corporation should be reported indicating the government authority as debtor, or should the public quasi-corporation be reported as a distinct debtor? How should the relationship between the public quasi-corporation and the owning government authority be reflected?
Answer
Where a public quasi-corporation constitutes an institutional unit that is party to an instrument reportable under AnaCredit, it should be reported as the debtor.
This treatment follows directly from Regulation (EU) 2016/867 (the AnaCredit Regulation). Article 1(10) of the AnaCredit Regulation defines a counterparty, including a debtor, as an institutional unit that is a party to an instrument or has an affiliation with a party to an instrument. Article 1(3) specifies that the term institutional unit has the same meaning as in paragraphs 2.12 and 2.13 of Annex A to Regulation (EU) No 549/2013 (ESA 2010). Furthermore, Article 4(1)(b) requires reporting agents to report instruments where the debtor is a legal entity or a part of a legal entity.
According to ESA 2010, quasi-corporations are entities that have no separate legal status but keep a complete set of accounts and exhibit economic and financial behaviour that is distinct from that of their owners and similar to that of corporations. As a result, they are deemed to have autonomy of decision and are recognised as separate institutional units. Public quasi-corporations are quasi-corporations that are controlled by government units. In fact, public quasi-corporations are only one specific category within a broader set of quasi-corporations recognised by ESA 2010.
Consequently, where a public quasi-corporation enters into a credit arrangement in its capacity as a separate institutional unit, reporting agents should report the public quasi-corporation as the debtor in AnaCredit, rather than the government authority within which it operates or by which it is controlled. The fact that a public quasi-corporation lacks separate legal personality under national law does not alter this treatment for AnaCredit purposes.
To capture the relationship between the public quasi-corporation and the respective government authority, the latter should be reported as the immediate parent undertaking of the public quasi-corporation using the “Immediate parent undertaking identifier” attribute in AnaCredit. The ultimate parent undertaking must also be reported.
To enable the reporting and identification of counterparties recognised as quasi-corporations for AnaCredit purposes, reporting agents should use the generic value QCORP (quasi-corporation).
Note that this guidance is limited to the treatment of public quasi-corporations for the purposes described above and should not be interpreted as providing general guidance on the reporting of quasi-corporations more broadly. For any AnaCredit data attributes not explicitly addressed in this Q&A, reporting agents should apply the provisions of the AnaCredit Regulation and the associated AnaCredit reporting manuals and technical documentation in the same manner as for any other debtor, taking into account the nature of the entity (not a legal entity).