The measure, which is expressed in Instruction No. 01/2022 of 22 February, aims to "increase the efficiency of the foreign exchange market".
For this purpose, the BNA "decided to continue to expand the base of entities that negotiate the purchase of foreign currency with commercial banks through the Bloomberg FXGO trading platform", having decided "to assign to the main national importers that meet certain requirements, the access to trading on that platform".
According to the instruction, importers who trade operations through FXGO can only buy foreign currency from commercial banks or the BNA on the platform.
They will also be able to "negotiate operations with a value greater than the equivalent of 50,000 dollars", with operations of lesser value having to be negotiated directly with commercial banks.
To gain access to the platform, importers must request authorization from the BNA. The instruction also lists that, for this, importers must meet certain requirements such as the fact that they are classified as 'Large Taxpayers' by the General Tax Administration and that their accounts have been audited in the last two years by an entity certified by the Portuguese Accounting Association and Angolan Accounting Experts.
Commercial banks are responsible for verifying that importers meet the requirements before submitting their requests to the Asset Markets Department.
In the event of non-compliance, the BNA informs that penalties will be applied, including "temporary or permanent ban on trading operations in foreign currency".
See the full instruction here.
