Press releases

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today its final Guidelines on disclosure of encumbered and unencumbered assets. They are the first step towards a harmonised disclosure framework of asset encumbrance in the EU and have been drafted in accordance with Recommendation D of the European Systemic Risk Board (ESRB).

The European Banking Authority (EBA) launched today a consultation on its draft Regulatory Technical Standards (RTS) specifying the conditions for the permanent and temporary uses of the Standardised Approach (SA) by institutions that have received permission to use the Internal Ratings Based (IRB) Approach. The EBA has identified the use of the SA as a major driver in the comparability of credit risk capital requirements. These RTS will be part of the EU Single Rulebook aimed at enhancing regulatory harmonisation in the banking sector. The consultation runs until 26 September 2014.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today its fifth semi-annual report on risks and vulnerabilities of the EU banking sector. The report shows improvements in market sentiment and confidence which has allowed banks to increase their capital levels ahead of the 2014 EU-wide stress test and to continue the repair of their balance sheets. However, the report cautions about ongoing uncertainties on asset valuations and future profitability in an environment where the signs of recovery remain modest and fragile. The report also draws attention to looming redress costs related to conduct issues as well as to geo-political concerns in emerging markets, which could lead to risk aversion and to an impact on capital flows.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today a report analysing the impact that the revised IAS 19 Employee Benefits in conjunction with the deduction of net pension assets under the Capital Requirements Regulation (CRR) and changes in net pension liabilities may have on the volatility of institutions' own funds. The report concluded that in most cases there may be limited volatility of own funds due to changes in the accounting and prudential requirements that derive from the revised IAS 19 Employee Benefits and the CRR.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today its final draft Regulatory Technical Standards (RTS) on the minimum monetary amount of the professional indemnity insurance or comparable guarantee for mortgage credit intermediaries (RTS on PII).

The European Banking Authority (EBA) issued a revised list of validation rules in its Implementing Technical Standards (ITS) on supervisory reporting, which also includes several rules which have been deactivated. National authorities throughout the EU are informed that data submitted in accordance with these Implementing Technical Standards (ITS) should not be validated against the set of deactivated rules.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) launched today a consultation on draft Implementing Technical Standards (ITS) and Regulatory Technical Standards (RTS) aimed at specifying the EU framework for the conduct of annual supervisory benchmarking of internal approaches for calculating own funds requirements for credit and market risk exposures (RWAs). The consultation runs until 19 August 2014.

The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA) and the European Banking Authority (EBA) published today their Joint Committee final Report on guidelines for handling consumer complaints in the securities and banking sectors. The document aims to increase market confidence and for the benefit of consumers and firms alike it will ensure a harmonised approach to handling complaints for all 28 EU Member States and across all financial services sectors.

Consumer and investor protection is a common statutory objective of the three European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) - the European Banking Authority (EBA), the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA) and the European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA). As part of delivering on this objective, and following the first Joint ESAs Consumer Protection Day last year in Paris, the ESAs organised the second Joint ESAs Consumer Protection Day on 4 June 2014 in London.

The supervisory reporting templates, including those on liquidity, contained in the Implementing Technical Standards (ITS) on supervisory reporting drafted by the European Banking Authority (EBA), adopted by the European Commission (EC) on 16 April 2014 and due to be published soon in the EU Official Journal, are a correct legal transposition of the relevant provisions laid down in the Capital Requirements Regulation (CRR).

The EBA launches today a consultation on three Guidelines related to the information that institutions in the EU banking sector should disclose under Part Eight of the Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (Capital Requirements Regulation - CRR). These Guidelines have been merged into one single document and cover how institutions should apply materiality, proprietary and confidentiality in relation to the disclosure requirements, as well as how they should assess the frequency of their disclosures. This work will enhance consistency in disclosure practices across the EU and are part of the work of the EBA aimed at ensuring transparency in the EU banking sector. The consultation runs until 13 September 2014.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today a report providing a detailed analysis on remuneration practices across a sample of EU banks. The report, based on data collected on a consolidated basis from 2010 to 2012, sets benchmarks for different aspects of remuneration policies, and provides additional insight into the previously published data on “high earners” (staff earning EUR one million or more per year). Overall, the report shows an increasing trend in the remuneration paid to “risk takers”, as well as a material shift from variable to fixed remuneration.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) launched today a consultation on draft Regulatory Technical Standards (RTS) assessing the criteria that competent authorities need to consider before granting institutions permission to use advanced measurement approaches (AMA) for calculating their capital requirements for operational risk. These RTS will be part of the Single Rulebook aimed at enhancing regulatory harmonisation in the banking sector in the European Union. The consultation runs until 12 September 2014.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today a second report on the consistency of risk weighted assets (RWAs) in the residential mortgage portfolio. The report, which is part of a wider ongoing EBA work on comparability of RWAs, illustrates the findings of a so called “drill-down analysis”, an investigation on the extent to which the most commonly used risk drivers influence the variability in risk weights. Overall, the analysis confirmed that risk parameters, such as loan to value, are drivers of RWAs. However, there are differences in how the banks reflect such drivers in RWAs.

The European Central Bank (ECB) and the European Banking Authority (EBA) published today a third version of the classification system that links their respective reporting frameworks. This common system, which will support EU banks in their reporting exercise to both the EBA and the ECB, supersedes the second version published in March 2012 and aims at providing a better understanding of the links between the two different reporting frameworks of the ECB and the EBA, while creating synergies between datasets that were originally designed for different purposes.