CFCL Settlement - Greece

Settlement process in T2S

Please refer to the Settlement process in T2S for the complete information about the Settlement process in T2S.

Settlement services

Pre-matching service

The table below summarizes CFCL's pre-matching service for external settlement instructions, as well as the pre-matching method and start time in the market. For details of CFCL's pre-matching services, see Pre-matching services for external settlement instructions.

Local pre-matching, which is market practice for instructions in equities and debt securities, starts, subject to counterparty availability, on receipt of instructions and continues until Settlement Date (SD).

Domestic allegement matching service

Complementary to the pre-matching services offered and where no pre-matching instruction has been sent to the market, CFCL accepts allegements via its agent from domestic market counterparties. and then uses the allegement messages to search for the best matching client instruction. If no matching client instruction is found, the allegement is reported to the client provided that its CFCL account number is present.

For details of CFCL's domestic allegement service, see Pre-matching services for external settlement instructions.

Procedures for domestic counterparties

ATHEXCSD eligible securities

Citibank, Athens acts as custodian and operator of the following omnibus account for CBL at ATHEXCSD:

• SAT code: 0007793119-1
• SAT account: 0742491940-7
• Operator code: 0000000505

Note: SAT is the Dematerialised Securities System of AthexCSD.

Linkage of trading codes (OASIS codes) with accounts in ATHEXCSD

When the client/end-investor has an execution agreement with a local broker who is a direct member of ATHEX (that is, no remote or international broker-dealer is involved), the client is requested to advise the local broker that the linkage between OASIS code (trading code in ATHEX) and the ATHEXCSD account into which the trade settles is not applicable to trades that settle on CFCL’s account at ATHEXCSD.

Specific settlement rules/settlement restrictions

Clients’ instructions must be in line with the following rules:

• Trade date cannot be later than settlement date;
• Settlement date cannot be in the past;
• The instruction must be received before the instruction deadline;
• The format of the instruction must be in line with the respective instruction specifications.

Settlement of Over-the-Counter (OTC) trades (off-exchange)

In order to benefit from straight-through processing, the client must complete fields as follows to specify the type of OTC transaction that will apply:

a. Information on the final beneficial owner is a matching criteria in ATHEXCSD and must be provided in each OTC re-registration instruction.

b. Used after T+2 if Client Settlement failed.

Fees and charges

The following market fees and charges (set by ATHEXCSD and given as an indication only) are applied in the settlement process:

• Settlement of Stock Exchange trades (on-exchange)
  OTC rectification trade: EUR 20 per party (buyer and seller).
• Settlement of OTC trades (off-exchange)
  Normal OTC transactions: 6.5 basis points (bps) per trade made, that is, 3.25 bps per party (buyer and seller) on the value of the transaction with a minimum fee of EUR 20.
• OTC NCBO: EUR 20 per party (deliverer CSD account and receiver CSD account).
  Re-registration: EUR 20 per party (deliverer CSD account and receiver CSD account).
  Collateral: EUR 20 per party (collateral giver and collateral receiver).
  Borrowing and lending: EUR 20 per party (borrower and lender).
  Against payment transactions will incur an additional charge of EUR 1.00 per party.
  ATHEXCSD will calculate the charges for the OTC transactions as follows:
  • For free of payment trades: Closing price of the stock on trade date;
  • For against payment trades: Trade price in client instructions.

All charges incurred by CFCL in the “trading and settlement” process will be passed on to the relevant client on an “upon receipt” basis.

Sales tax

Please refer to Greece: Sales Tax for more information. 

Back-to-back processing

Back-to-back processing is not available for transactions in ATHEXCSD eligible securities.

New issues settlement

Clients that would like to participate in an IPO or Secondary Public Offering should contact their local broker. In addition, to ensure timely settlement of the subscriptions, clients should instruct CFCL using the Immediate Release (IREL) functionality (see "Pre-matching service" above) in order to allow provisioning before 15:00 on SD-1.

Settlement Discipline Regime and related domestic market settlement functionalities

Recycling of pending transaction

Matched OTC trades that have not settled will be cancelled by AthexCSD after 60 business days. Unmatched OTC trades will be recycled for 20 business days. Following that period, these trades will be cancelled by AthexCSD.

Bilateral cancellation

This means that matched instructions can only be cancelled if both domestic counterparties request a cancellation of their instructions.

Until the cancellation confirmation is received from the market, the instruction will remain eligible for settlement, that is, the instruction may be provisioned and proposed for settlement and may be subject to cash penalties.

Cash tolerances

For domestic instructions against payment in EUR, the following cash tolerance levels will apply (as at present):

• EUR 2 for transactions of an amount up to or equal to EUR 100,000; and
• EUR 25 for transactions of an amount greater than EUR 100,000.

With non-EUR currencies, for settlement amounts equivalent to less than or equal to EUR 100,000, the tolerance level will be equivalent to EUR 2, while for settlement amounts that are equivalent to more than EUR 100,000, the tolerance level will be equivalent to EUR 25. For settlement instructions in currencies other than EUR, CSDs should use the official exchange rates of the European Central Bank (ECB), valid on 1 January of the respective calendar year.

For domestic against payment instructions, the maximum discrepancy tolerated in settlement matching varies in accordance with market practice and the conditions of the domestic link.

Matching information

The trade date is a mandatory matching criteria and domestic instructions will follow local market rules.

Cash penalties

Penalties will be calculated and applied on matched settlement instructions that fail to settle, in full or in part, on and after their intended settlement date (ISD), if both the settlement instruction and the relevant financial instrument are subject to cash penalties.

Instruments subject to cash penalties

Any financial instrument listed in the Financial Instruments Reference Data System (FIRDS) database maintained by ESMA will be subject to cash penalties. However, cash penalties will not apply to shares listed in the Short Selling Regulation (SSR) exemption.