Venera Agani

Central Bank of the Republic of Kosovo

The Central Bank of Republic of Kosovo (the "CBK"), a successor to the Banking and Payments Authority of Kosovo and to the Central Banking Authority of Kosovo was established on June 2008 with the approval of the Law No. 03/L-074 on "Central Bank of the Republic of Kosovo" by the Kosovo Assembly. The CBK is an independent legal entity with full authority as a legal person according to law in force in Kosovo, and reports to the Kosovo Assembly. The CBK principal objectives are to: a) Foster the soundness, solvency and efficient functioning of a stable market based financial system, encouraging market emergence of safe financial instruments; and b) Without prejudice to this, support the general economic policies in Kosovo with a view to contributing to an efficient allocation of resources in accordance with the principles of an open market economy.The CBK has the following specific powers: a) to recommend broad policy guidelines to the Assembly and Government in areas under its responsibility; b) to formulate and implement measures for payments and settlement systems for transactions in domestic and foreign currency in Kosovo, and to supervise and regulate payments; c) to own and operate one or more payments systems; d) to act as banker to the Ministry of Finance and Economy and to provide financial advice at Ministry request; e) to act as fiscal agent to the Ministry of Finance and Economy; f) to maintain a depository for safe keeping of currency and securities; g) to hold foreign currency deposits of banks, Ministry of Finance and Economy and other public entities; h) to ensure an adequate supply of bank notes and coins for the settlement of cash transactions; i) to license, supervise and regulate financial institutions; more (http://www.bqk-kos.org/?cid=2,2)