PORTUGAL Law and Practice Contributed by: João G Gil Figueira, Rodrigue Devillet Lima and Catarina Andrade Miranda, GFDL Advogados
impediment to developing and using alternative pay - ment rails, the payment service scene in Portugal is highly dominated by SIBS, which holds control over the ATM network and is considered to be one of the most advanced systems in the world. 5.2 Regulation of Cross-Border Payments and Remittances Payment transactions are governed by the EU Pay - ment Services Directives, adopted into Portuguese law through Decree-Law No 91/2018 of 12 November, and fall within the jurisdiction of the Bank of Portugal. As an EU member state, Portugal falls under the geographical influence set by the SEPA Regulation (Regulation (EU) No 260/2012), which outlines the SEPA, crucial in facilitating seamless cross-border money transfers. For instance, the regulation prohibits companies from rejecting cross-border direct debits, commonly called “IBAN discrimination”, by mandat - ing acceptance of all EU payment accounts reachable through SEPA mandates. Non-regulatory rules regarding cross-border pay - ments and currency remittance usually stem from AML and anti-tax fraud concerns, with mandatory documenting and reporting required. Portugal trans - posed Directive (EU) 2020/284 (regarding introducing certain requirements for payment service providers), imposing additional requirements on payment service providers to maintain records for three years. Additionally, EU Regulation 2021/1230 of 14 July 2021 establishes the rules for cross-border payments and the transparency of currency conversion charges within the EU. 6. Marketplaces, Exchanges and Trading Platforms 6.1 Permissible Trading Platforms The regulation applicable to financial assets trading platforms derives from MiFID II rules. Euronext Lisbon, the only stock exchange in Portu - gal, is the most prominent trading ground for shares and other securities. Securities trading platforms
are supervised by CMVM, ensuring compliance with transparency and market integrity standards. Multilateral trading facilities (MTFs) are also regulated under Portuguese law and constitute alternative trad - ing platforms enabling securities trading beyond con - ventional stock exchanges. MTFs are subject to the CMVM’s supervision and offer more adaptable trading conditions at lower costs. The only MTFs in operation in Portugal are Euronext Growth and Euronext Access, both managed by the Euronext group. Organised trading platforms (OTFs) specialise in trading specific securities such as derivatives and have stricter regulations than MTFs. They must sat - isfy transparency and market integrity criteria while ensuring the absence of conflicts of interest influenc - ing trade execution. The new EU DLT Pilot Regime offers the opportunity to develop new types of platforms. Nevertheless, the novelty of this new legal framework has yet to be put to the test in the Portuguese jurisdiction, despite domestic legislation already having been enacted to allow its implementation under Decree-Law No 66/2023 of 8 August. Finally, crypto exchange platforms can also be con - sidered a regulated marketplace. See 6.3 Impact of the Emergence of Cryptocurrency Exchanges for more details. 6.2 Regulation of Different Asset Classes Different asset classes will have different regulations and, in some cases, fall under the supervision of dif - ferent regulators. Financial instruments typically fall under the scope of MiFID II, and fintech operators operating marketplaces are supervised by the CMVM. Virtual assets, if qualified as securities, will fall under the jurisdiction of the CMVM and are regulated by the DLT Pilot Regime and recently enacted domes - tic regulations. At the same time, fintech operators may require authorisation from the Bank of Portugal to operate as virtual asset service providers if non- security virtual assets are traded. Hypothetically, depending on the virtual asset admit - ted to trading in the marketplace, a virtual asset ser -
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