based on elements such as: (i) signed contracts of “General Conditions for Administration of Investments”; (ii) specific instructions given by clients to the Banco de Montevideo; (iii) the reception by the petitioner of bank statements showing the respective operation, without the petitioner raising objections or making observations, as established in article 35 of Law 6,895; (iv) the interest rates enjoyed by the petitioner, for his share in the certificates of deposit or other product, in the understanding that they enjoyed interest rates that were considerably higher than those offered on fixed-term deposits in the Banco de Montevideo and were also significantly higher than market rates, and (v) the petitioner’s investment profile or regularity in regard to such operations”; that “[t]he first two elements were considered elements of express consent and, regarding the others, it indicated that they could constitute forms of implied consent under banking practice”; that it “indicated repeatedly that, under banking law, both banking norms and banking practice were applicable, so that “implied consent, and verbal orders by the clients, even by telephone, constitute a reiterated practice under banking law that has give rise to general awareness (‘opinio juris’) of their existence and compulsory nature.”46 In other words, the judgment indicates expressly that the Contentious-Administrative Tribunal analyzed and ruled on the requirement established in article 31 in terms of “without their consent.” Nevertheless, it is true that it did not do so with regard to the defects that, in some cases, could have impaired this consent, because it considered that its function was to rule on the appeal for annulment filed “against the final decision of the Board of the Central Bank,”47 which, in turn, had expressly considered that “the declaration of the annulment of the acceptance of the investment, and any contractual responsibility for the unsuccessful operations carried out that involved error, fraud or negligence, necessarily constitute[d] jurisdictional decisions that exceed[ed] the sphere of the powers granted to the Central Bank of Uruguay under article 31 of Law 17,613.”48 In other words, since the Bank had ruled that it was not its responsibility to decide on the possible defects that could have impaired the consent that had been granted, what the Contentious-Administrative Tribunal did is consider that this ruling, in the terms of the Constitution – and recorded in the judgment – is not “contrary to a rule of law, [and had not] been issued with misuse, abuse or excess of power”;49 in other words, it also ruled on the issue, but not in the sense that the appellants hoped. In this regard, it is also appropriate to note that the judgment mentions that, in the cases submitted to it, the ordinary justice system examined the issue of defects of consent,50 which would indicate that this remedy also was available to the appellants. Furthermore, based on the two preceding paragraphs, it might have been necessary to consider whether article 31 included the Bank’s competence to rule on its own competence; namely, whether or not the Bank had what is known in the judicial sphere as the “competence of the competence,” or whether that corresponded to administrative or judicial instances. Also, it might have been useful to consider whether the decision on competence is a matter of domestic law or international law. Certainly, it seems more logical to consider that, following a decision by the Bank on its competence in the matter, it was possible to have recourse to the Contentious-Administrative Tribunal and that this discussion belongs to the sphere of domestic law; whereas it corresponds to the sphere of international law, in this case the Court, to assess the act that, ultimately, 46 Para. 156. 47 Para. 205. 48 Paras. 95 and 134. 49 Para. 101. 50 Para. 108. 12