Page 248 - Special Topic Session (STS) - Volume 3

STS 543 Luís T. D. et al.
2. The New Portuguese Central Credit Register
The Portuguese CCR is an information system managed by the Statistics
Department of the Bank, which contains monthly granular information on
credit granted by the institutions participating in the system – all resident
2
3
credit-granting institutions .
Over time, the CCR has shown a significant and increasing potential and
usefulness to support several central bank’s functions. Currently, given its
granularity and virtually complete coverage, CCR data are used by the Bank,
4
inter alia, for the following tasks :
 Compiling comprehensive statistics on credit, with breakdowns by,
inter alia, institutional sector of the borrower, sector of activity, type of
instrument, purpose, size of firms, location/region, original and
residual maturity, type of guarantees, and amount of credit exposure;
 Assessing credit concentration and distribution;
 Watching carefully the evolution of overdue loans and overdue loans’
ratios;
 Understanding the risks underlying banks’ balance sheets;
 Contributing to the Bank’s own in-house credit risk assessment system;
5
 Monitoring the use of credit claims as collateral for Eurosystem credit
operations.

The Impact of AnaCredit in the Portuguese CCR
Since 2007, the European System of Central Banks has been exploring the
potential of CCRs for statistical purposes, in order to gain a better overview of
credit developments in the Member-States of the European Union. In
particular, it was sought to understand how the scope and content of national
CCRs could be improved and adapted to meet European statistical needs,
while fostering a reduction of the reporting burden of the participants and an
increase in transparency.
In 2011, the European Central Bank (ECB) together with all euro area and
some non-euro area national central banks, launched the AnaCredit project .
6

2 There is a virtually complete coverage – all loans with an initial amount of EUR 50 or more
must be reported
3 The participating institutions are the following: Monetary Financial Institutions (MFIs) – that
is, banks, savings banks and mutual agricultural credit banks; non-monetary financial
institutions that grant credit; public agencies that grant credit, and non-financial corporations
acquiring loans from the resident financial sector. By law, the participation of these types of
institutions in the CCR is mandatory.
4 For a more detailed discussion on the Portuguese CCR and its several uses please see Matos
(2015) and Matos & Dias (2017).
5 The Eurosystem comprises the European Central Bank and the national central banks of the
European Union Member-States that have adopted the euro.
6 The name stands for “analytical credit datasets”.
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