Article 5
Annual supervisory fee for registered credit rating agencies
1.
A registered credit rating agency shall be charged an annual supervisory fee.
By way of derogation from the first subparagraph, a registered credit rating agency shall be exempted from paying an annual supervisory fee where its total revenues as published in its most recent audited accounts is less than EUR 10 million, or in case it belongs to a group of credit rating agencies, where the group of credit rating agencies has aggregate total revenues of less than EUR 10 million.
2.
The annual supervisory fee for a given financial year shall be calculated as follows:
(a)
the basis for the calculation of the annual supervisory fee for a given financial year shall be the estimate of expenditure relating to the supervision of credit rating agencies as included in the ESMA budget for that year, set out and approved in accordance with Article 63 of Regulation (EU) No 1095/2010;
(b)
the relevant amount for the calculation of the annual supervisory fee for a given financial year shall be the estimate of expenditure referred to in point (a) reduced by the annual supervisory fee referred to in Article 7;
(c)
a registered credit rating agency as referred to in paragraph 1 shall pay as an annual supervisory fee a part of the relevant amount which corresponds to the ratio of the credit rating agency’s applicable turnover to the total applicable turnover of all registered credit rating agencies required to pay an annual supervisory fee in accordance with paragraph 1.
3.
The annual supervisory fee shall be paid in a single instalment, which shall be due by no later than the end of March of the year to which it relates.
ESMA shall send debit notes to the credit rating agencies concerned specifying the amount of the annual supervisory fee at least 30 calendar days before the day when annual fees are to be paid.
The annual supervisory fee shall not be reimbursed.