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The European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) have appointed three new members to the Board of Appeal of the ESAs.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) launched today a consultation on its Guidelines regarding the types of exposures to be associated with high risk under Article 128 (3) of the Capital Requirements Regulation (CRR). The Guidelines specify which types of exposures, other than those mentioned in Article 128 (2) CRR, are to be associated with particularly high risk and under which circumstances. The Guidelines also clarify the notion of investments in venture capital firms and private equity. The consultation runs until 17 July 2018.

The securities, banking and insurance sectors in the European Union (EU) face multiple risks, the latest report on risks and vulnerabilities by the Joint Committee of the European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) shows. The ESA report for the second half of 2017 outlines the following risks as potential sources of instability:

The Joint Committee of the European Supervisory Authorities (ESAs) published today its final report on Big Data analysing its impact on consumers and financial firms. Overall, the ESAs have found that while the development of Big Data poses some potential risks to financial services consumers, the benefits of this innovation currently outweigh these. Many of the risks identified by the ESAs are mitigated by existing legislation.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) updated today the list of closely correlated currencies that was originally published in December 2013 and updated in October 2016 . The list is part of the implementing technical standards (ITS) that were drafted for the purposes of calculating the capital requirements for foreign-exchange risk according to the standardised rules. The list was updated according to the procedure and methodology laid down in the ITS and submitted to the European Commission for endorsement.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today its report on benchmarking of remuneration practices in EU banks for the financial years 2015 and 2016 and high earners data for 2016. The data shows that in 2016, the number of high earners in EU banks receiving a remuneration of more than EUR 1 million decreased by 10.6% (from 5 142 in 2015 to 4 597 in 2016). In addition, for high earners, the average ratio between the variable and fixed remuneration continued to decrease from 127% in 2014 to 118% in 2015 and 104% in 2016. The same holds true for the ratio between the variable and fixed remuneration of all other identified staff, which decreased from 65.5 % in 2014 to 62.2 % in 2015 and 57.1 % in 2016. The report is part of the EBA’s monitoring activities and focuses on the identification of staff, the application of deferral arrangements, the pay out in instruments and the use of specific remuneration elements, e.g. guaranteed variable remuneration and severance payments.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today the regular update of its Risk Dashboard summarising the main risks and vulnerabilities in the EU banking sector for Q4 2017. The progress is positive for European banks, but risks remain heightened on sustainable profitability. Following the ESRB recommendation on commercial real estate markets , the EBA’s Risk Dashboard has an additional page showing the aggregated real estate exposures referred to real estate activities and the construction sector.

In compliance with the ESRB recommendation E 2016/14 on closing real estate data gaps, the EBA has included an additional page in its updated Risk Dasboard to disclose aggregated exposures referred to real estate activities (NACE code L) and the construction sector (NACE code F). All this information relies solely on the current reporting framework (ITS) and some items, included under NACE L and F, would need to be excluded in order to follow the commercial real estate definition adopted in the ESRB Recommendation. All the figures shown are aggregated by country of the counterparty and do not include EU subsidiaries. Both tables rely on a threshold-based template, and it may be subject to data gaps for some EU countries, as not all the banks are obliged to report such information.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) launched today a public consultation to propose extending the scope of application of the existing Joint Committee (JC) Guidelines on complaints-handling to the new institutions established under the revised Payment Service Directive (PSD2) and the Mortgage Credit Directive (MCD). The proposal, which does not envisage any changes to the substance of the existing Guidelines, will ensure that an identical set of requirements for complaints-handling continues to apply to all financial institutions across the banking, investment and insurance sectors. The extension of the scope will provide consumers with the same level of protection, irrespective of which regulated product or service they are purchasing and which regulated institution they are purchasing it from. The consultation runs until 27 May 2018.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today its final Guidelines under the revised Payment Services Directive (PSD2), on the criteria on how to stipulate the minimum monetary amount of the professional indemnity insurance (PII) or other comparable guarantee for payment initiation services (PIS) and account information services (AIS). Undertakings intending to carry out these services will need PII cover or a comparable guarantee as a prerequisite to be granted authorisation. The Guidelines, therefore, contribute to the overall objectives of PSD2, by strengthening the liability regime governing the interactions between the different actors involved in electronic payment transactions.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today an updated list of regional governments and local authorities that may be treated as central governments for the calculation of capital requirements, in accordance with the EU Capital Requirements Regulation (CRR).

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today a Report, which assesses the current Credit Risk Mitigation (CRM) framework, as part of its work on the review of the IRB approach. This Report is part of the 4th and last phase of the EBA’s roadmap on the IRB approach, which also includes a review of supervisory practices, a harmonised definition of default and clarifications on modelling approaches to be used by institutions.

The European Banking Authority published today its Report on the functioning of supervisory colleges in 2017, which summarises the EBA’s assessment of the colleges’ activities against the EBA 2017 Colleges Action Plan and the relevant regulation. The Report concludes that significant improvements have been achieved over the last couple of years in college interactions, responsiveness, and in the quality, coverage and reasoning of the joint decision documents. Further efforts are, however, expected both from home and host supervisors to enhance the joint decision process and ensure the completeness of the SREP assessments.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today a FinTech Roadmap setting out its priorities for 2018/2019. The Roadmap also sets out the establishment of a FinTech Knowledge Hub to enhance knowledge sharing and foster technological neutrality in regulatory and supervisory approaches.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today an Opinion following the notification by the French High Council for Financial Stability (HCSF) of its intention to tighten the large-exposure limits applicable to large and highly indebted non-financial corporations (NFCs) resident in France or groups of connected NFCs assessed to be highly indebted and based in France. Based on the evidence submitted, the EBA does not object to the adoption of the proposed measure, which the HCSF intends to apply only to global or other systemically important institutions (G-SIIs and O-SIIs) with the aim of accounting for changes in the intensity of macroprudential/systemic risk that could pose a threat to financial stability in France.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) published today its advice on the Commission’s proposal for statutory prudential backstops on banks’ provisioning practices for new loans that turn non-performing. The EBA notes that the backstop complements the existing prudential set of measures and the new accounting provisions under IFRS9 and the advice aims at providing some qualitative considerations as well as a conservative impact analysis of the proposed measures.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) launched today a call for expression of interest for membership to its Banking Stakeholder Group (BSG), as the mandate for the majority of its members will expire on 14 October 2018. The call for expression of interest is open to candidates representing stakeholders across the European Union. The deadline for application is 7 June 2018.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) issued today a revised list of validation rules in its Implementing Technical Standards (ITS) on supervisory reporting, highlighting those which have been deactivated either for incorrectness or for triggering IT problems. Competent Authorities throughout the EU are informed that data submitted in accordance with these ITS should not be formally validated against the set of deactivated rules.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) released today a video to help all interested stakeholders get familiar with the key features of the two sets of EBA templates on non-performing loans (NPLs) published on 14 December 2017. The EBA designed the templates to help restart the secondary markets for NPLs in Europe, thus contributing to the European Council’s action plan to tackle NPLs in Europe, released in July 2017.

The European Banking Authority (EBA) launched today a consultation on its Guidelines for credit institutions on how to effectively manage non-performing exposures (NPEs) and forborne exposures (FBEs). The Guidelines target high NPE banks with the aim of achieving a sustainable reduction of NPEs to strengthen the resilience of their balance sheets and support lending into the real economy. The Guidelines are designed to ensure that consumers, who have taken out loans, are treated fairly at every stage of the loan life cycle. The consultation runs until 8 June 2018.