Recognising the need to implement a comprehensive cross border transactions and domestic foreign
currency transactions monitoring system as a key national priority, the Central Bank of Sri Lanka
(CBSL) has implemented a new data collecting system known as the International Transactions
Reporting System (ITRS) with the participation of Licensed Commercial Banks (LCBs) and Licensed
Specialised Banks (LSBs). The ITRS is a comprehensive data gathering system on cross border
transactions and domestic foreign currency transactions and is aimed at filling multitude of existing
data gaps. It will help policy formulation in many aspects by providing valuable inputs for both
statistical and regulatory purposes. The ITRS system will serve a number of purposes, including the
enhancement of Balance of Payments Statistics, including export proceeds, imports, services account
transactions such as IT/BPO transactions, workers’ remittances, financial account transactions, and
many other statistical data inputs. The ITRS will also serve the purpose of data reporting by banks for
regulatory requirements. Data from the ITRS system is also used as supporting information for future
policy decisions, such as origins of foreign currency outflows from the country for education, medical,
tourism and other purposes. The ITRS will also centralise information gathering by the Central Bank
enabling a more convenient data reporting by banks. The Phase 1 of the ITRS goes live from 21 June
2022. The system is also expected to facilitate further centralised data reporting of the Central Bank
in the next phases of the project.
All banks are required to report information related to transactions in the Phase 1 of the project as
detailed in ITRS Interphase Requirements, through the ITRS ‘Web Application’, developed by the
Central Bank. The ITRS Monitoring Unit, established at the Central Bank, will closely work with banks
on a daily basis to ensure the accuracy, timeliness and the coverage of the data provided.
These reporting requirements are exercised based on the powers conferred by the Monetary Law Act,
No. 58 of 1949, Banking Act No. 30 of 1988 and Foreign Exchange Act No. 12 of 2017.
