Legal Entity Identifiers: A call to action for listed companies and issuers by the Luxembourg Stock Exchange

The Luxembourg Stock Exchange (the LSE) has called upon Luxembourg and foreign issuers (collectively Issuers) of financial instruments listed in Luxembourg, whether on the LSE’s regulated market (Bourse de Luxembourg) or multilateral trading facility (the Euro MTF), to communicate their Legal Entity Identifiers (LEI) to the LSE before 15 September 2017. 

What is a LEI? 

A LEI is a unique and universal 20-digit identifier based on the ISO 17442 international standard that is assigned to a legally distinct entity involved in financial transactions for the purpose of facilitating its certain identification and to serve as a basis for establishing counterparty risk monitoring rules and measuring systemic risk. 

LEI: The legal background and framework 

Following approval by the G20 in 2012 of a unique identifier framework for financial markets known as the Global Legal Entity Identifier System (GLEIS), the Financial Stability Board undertook the implementation of GLEIS by establishing a network of local entities known as Local Operating Units (LOU) for assigning LEIs. The Central Operating Unit (COU) serves to oversee the LOU network. In turn, the Regulatory Oversight Committee (ROC) ensures compliance with the G20-approved principles. 

The LSE, in its capacity as operator of the Luxembourg officially appointed mechanism (OAM), must collect LEIs from all Issuers and communicate them to the relevant supervisory authorities. The LSE, in accord with its duties as an OAM pursuant to article 7 of the Commission Delegated Regulation EU 2016/1437 of 19 May 2016 supplementing Directive 2004/109/EC (commonly referred to as the Transparency Directive), shall use LEIs as the unique identifiers of all Issuers. 

How to obtain and communicate a LEI to the LSE? 

An Issuer should obtain its LEI from the LOU in the jurisdiction where it is registered. 

Issuers that are entities or investment funds domiciled in Luxembourg can obtain a LEI through LuxCSD. Details are provided on the LuxCSD website. 

For Issuers that are entities domiciled outside of Luxembourg, a country-by-country LOU directory is available. Alternatively, an Issuer that is not domiciled in Luxembourg can seek assistance from the LSE in writing. 

LEIs should be communicated by Issuers to the LSE via email. 

LEI renewal 

In order to avoid their lapsing and to ensure that the data associated with them remains up-to-date, LEIs should be renewed annually by their registrants who will receive periodic renewal reminders in the course of a given year. Dechert (Luxembourg) LLP remains available to assist you with questions about the LEI framework or with the procedures for obtaining and/or communicating a LEI to the LSE. For further information, please contact: