BSP further amends Foreign Exchange regulations

The Monetary Board has approved amendments to FX regulations to adopt as permanent policy the majority of the operational relief measures for FX transactions under Circular No. 1080 dated 27 March 2020 and related Circular Letters and unwind the remaining temporary measure introduced by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The amendments are in line with the BSP’s thrust to further streamline procedures and documentary requirements for FX transactions.

The major amendments include the adoption as a permanent policy of the following:

1. Issuance in electronic form of BSP – International Operations Department (IOD) documents [e.g., BSP letter-approval, Bangko Sentral Registration Document (BSRD)];
2. Electronic submission of BSP-IOD issued documents to authorized agent banks (AABs)/AAB subsidiary or affiliate forex corporations (AAB forex corps) and to the BSP;
3. Electronic submission of BSP-IOD application forms without the required electronic/digital signatures, provided that same shall be accompanied with the required attestation from the submitting party;
4. Electronic submission of reports to BSP-IOD;
5. Lifting of the notarization requirement for certain supporting documents for trade and non-trade current account transactions, and foreign investments; and
6. Lifting of the applicable processing fee in relation to non-compliance with prescriptive period for submission to BSP-IOD of applications/requests for various FX transactions.

Relatedly, documents issued by the BSP-IOD in electronic form starting 27 March 2020 (e.g., BSP letter-approval, provisional BSRDs) shall remain valid even after the period covered by Circular No. 1080. Hence, the BSP shall no longer issue original hardcopies to replace said BSP documents.

Meanwhile, the waiver of monetary penalties for delays incurred in the submission of reports to the BSP-IOD shall remain effective until 30 June 2023 (unless extended by BSP).

The implementing Circular will take effect 15 banking days after its publication.