Pope Francis has issued a canonical order for all agencies of the Holy See to deposit their liquid assets in the Institute for Religious Works (IOR), the Vatican bank.

In a rescript published in L’Osservatore Romano on August 23, the Pope said that the apostolic constitution Praedicate Evangelium should be understood to mean that the IOR has the sole authority to manage “the movable assets of the Holy See and of the institutions linked to the Holy See.”

The papal order makes it clear that Vatican offices are not to maintain separate bank accounts in non-Vatican institutions. The policy clearly applies to the Secretariat of State, which moved fund through other institutions to carry out the ill-fated London real-estate deal that is the basis for the current landmark criminal trial.

The new policy takes effect September 1, with all Vatican institutions required to transfer funds from other banks to the IOR “as soon as possible.”