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Disclaimer:

Q&As refer to the provisions in force on the day of their publication. The EBA does not systematically review published Q&As following the amendment of legislative acts. Users of the Q&A tool should therefore check the date of publication of the Q&A and whether the provisions referred to in the answer remain the same.

Please note that the Q&As related to the supervisory benchmarking exercises have been moved to the dedicated handbook page. You can submit Q&As on this topic here.

List of Q&A's

Discretionary pension benefits

According to Section 151 of the EBA Guidelines on sound remuneration policies under CRD (EBA/GL/2021/04) (“EBA Guidelines”), pension benefits that are not performance-based and are consistently granted to a category of staff as part of the company’s pension scheme should be regarded as routine employment packages. How should the concept of a “company’s pension scheme,” as referred to in Section 151 of the EBA Guidelines, be interpreted? For instance, can an established and consistently applied long-term practice qualify as a pension scheme, even in the absence of a formal written policy or documented scheme? 

  • Legal act: Directive 2013/36/EU (CRD)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: EBA/GL/2021/04 - Guidelines on sound remuneration policies under CRD (repealing EBA/GL/2015/22)

EBA Remuneration Diversity Benchmarking - R23.00 - Reporting of not applicable (n/a) gender pay gap

What should be reported in template R23.00 if the gender pay gap cannot be calculated?

  • Legal act: Directive 2013/36/EU (CRD)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Draft ITS on Supervisory Reporting of Institutions (for benchmarking the internal approaches)

Discretionary pension benefits

Proportionate regular pension contributions on top of the mandatory regime are cited as an example of routine employment packages in the definitions section of the EBA Guidelines on sound remuneration policies under CRD (EBA/GL/2021/04) (“EBA Guidelines”). How large may such annual pension contributions be — whether in monetary terms or as a percentage of the staff member’s total annual remuneration — for the benefit to be considered proportionate and, provided that other criteria are met, qualify as a routine employment package (and therefore as fixed remuneration)? Does the size or other characteristics of the institution influence the assessment of whether a pension benefit is proportionate or routine? More broadly, what factors typically affect this assessment — for instance, do national industry-level remuneration benchmarks or the remuneration level within a specific institution play a role?

  • Legal act: Directive 2013/36/EU (CRD)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: EBA/GL/2021/04 - Guidelines on sound remuneration policies under CRD (repealing EBA/GL/2015/22)

Determination of exposure value cap for netting sets subject to a margin agreement.

Article 274(3) states "The exposure value of a netting set that is subject to a contractual margin agreement shall be capped at the exposure value of the same netting set not subject to any form of margin agreement". This wording has slightly diverged from Basel CRE52.2 which stated "The EAD for a margined netting set is capped at the EAD of the same netting set calculated on an unmargined basis".  Basel focused on applying the unmargined methodology in the wording not that it should be treated as if there were no margin agreement. This nuance in wording is leading to a misinterpretation of the CRR which is exacerbated by EBA Q&A 2023_6962 which has allowed for firms to apply SA-CCR in a manner which significantly underestimates capital requirements vs economic exposure. In situations where firms are posting excess variation margin which has a real economic credit risk to the counterparty the wording of the CRR and the Q&A implies that this can be fully disregarded from the exposure calculation. This would therefore mean that firms are able to arbitrage the capital rules and avoid capital charges by lending money to counterparties by posting it as variation margin under a CSA and then disregarding that exposure by applying the "unmargined" cap. This needs to be resolved by a clarification to the EBA Q&A to the effect that any collateral posted/received under a variation margin CSA should still be included in the exposure calculation, albeit using the unmargined rather than margined formulation to achieve the effect that the cap is designed to do per Basel CRE52.2 FAQ1.  i.e. this could easily be interpreted that if you are not subject to a margin agreement then anything which was variation margin should now just be characterized as NICA as it still economically exists as collateral. This would satisfy both the purpose of the rule and avoid the risk of understatement of capital requirements.

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Additional liquidity outflows corresponding to collateral needs resulting from the impact of an adverse market scenario.

Pursuant to Article 423(3) of Regulation (EU) No 575/2013, institutions are to add an additional outflow corresponding to collateral needs that would result from the impact of an adverse market scenario on the institution's derivatives transactions if material.  Should this be extended to include financing transactions if an outflow corresponding to collateral needs from the impact of an adverse market scenario is deemed material by an institution?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Delegated Regulation (EU) 2015/61 - DR with regard to liquidity coverage requirement

Whether the derogation under Article 119 (5) of CRR can be applied in the context of Article 395(1) of CRR

According to article 119 (5) of CRR, exposures to financial institutions shall be treated as exposures to institutions when calculating risk weighted assets for credit risk. Is article 119(5) applicable for the purpose of calculating large exposure limits in accordance with Article 395 of CRR? 

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Interpretation of the treatment of covered bonds under the large exposures' regime in accordance with Article 395 of the CRR and the possibility of exposure reduction pursuant to Article 399 of the CRR.

Can covered bonds used as collateral in repo transactions, which are issued by the borrower (self-issued covered bonds), be considered eligible for exposure reduction under the large exposures regime in accordance with Article 399 of the CRR, taking into account the current interpretation of Article 207(2) of the CRR and Article 400(2) of the CRR, as well as the application of ECB Regulation (EU) 2016/445?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Interaction between CRR3 article 124 and article 193

When should an IPRE exposure be riskweighted at 150% according to CRR3 article 124 para 1 (b)?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Calculation of risk-weighted exposure amounts for off-balance exposure in case of Unfunded Credit Protection (UFCP)

What is the correct treatment in cases where the consideration of CRM according to articles 235, 235a or 236 leads to higher calculated risk-weighted exposure amounts than those calculated without considering CRM, even when the risk weight of the protection provider is lower? 

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Calculation of risk weights

How should institutions calculate a risk weight amended for credit protection in accordance with Chapter 4?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Reporting of callable AT1, T2 and MREL/TLAC instruments

Should the AT1, T2 and MREL/TLAC instruments be assigned 0% ASF weight one year before potential call date or only once permission to redeem was granted by the competent authority?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2021/451 – ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

application of condition specified in Article 501a. (1) o) after January 1, 2025

Are we correct that after January 1, 2025, during the examination of compliance with the ISF factor, it is necessary to examine point o) only in the case of exposures originated after January 1, 2025, and in the case of previous exposures originated before 1 January 2025 the debtor is not obligated to carry out any assessment?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Level of EVE, NII and MV under Baseline scenarios reported positive for individual currencies (material or immaterial) in J1 report

Why is expected to always have the Level of EVE, NII and MV under Baseline scenarios reported positive for individual currencies (material or immaterial) in J1 report? Currently for the the rows of J1 report which reffer to Level of EVE, NII and MV under Baseline scenarios there is a validation rule (v16332_s) which throws a warning if the amount is negative regardless if the report is aggregated or for individual currencies. We believe this rule should be applied only for aggregated currencies and not for individual currencies as there could be a situation where the bank has a liability exposure in a specific currency which will end as a negative level of EVE/ NII or MV but when the aggregated report is obtained the final values are positive. Also, if the current rule is maintained, the results from J3 report will not be consistent with the ones from J1 as the negative amounts have to be reported positive. 

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2021/451 – ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

Treatment of two-legs derivatives and validation Rule EBA V16337 (Tab J0200)

Could you please clarify the sign of the carrying amount for derivatives in J0200 ?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2021/451 – ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

v16319_s and v16322_s (IRRBB) – non-negative rule not applicable to derivative rows

In line with the de-activation of v22331_s, we request to de-activate v16319_s and v16322_s as well

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Draft ITS on Supervisory Reporting of Institutions

DPM 4.0 taxonomy, several validation rules are not correct

During the analysis of DPM 4.0 taxonomy, we identified the following issues in the validation rules: EBA validation rule, v23083_m (C25.01) Current rule: with {tC_25.01.a, (c0010, c0020, c0050, c0060, c0070, c0090, c0100, c0110, c0140, c0150, c0160, c0170, c0180, c0200, c0210, c0220, c0230, c0240, c0250, c0270, c0280, c0290), default: 0, interval: true}: {r0040} = {r0050} + {r0060} + {r0090} + {r0100} + {r0110} Proposal: the rule should be deactivated Reason: CVA-risk amounts can be non-additive due to portfolio effects   EBA validation rule, v23345_s  (C25.01) Current rule: with {tC_25.01.a, default:null, interval:false}: {(r0010, r0020, r0030, r0040, r0050, r0060, r0070, r0080, r0090, r0100, r0110, r0130), (c0010, c0020, c0060, c0100, c0110, c0140, c0150, c0160, c0170, c0180, c0200, c0210, c0220, c0230, c0240, c0250, c0270, c0280, c0290)} >= 0 Our Proposal: the rule should be deactivated Reason: Marginal CVA-risk amounts can be negative due to portfolio effects   EBA validation rule, v23710_s  (C25.01) Current rule: with {tC_25.01.a, default: null, interval: false}: {(r0010, r0020, r0030, r0040, r0050, r0060, r0070, r0080, r0090, r0100, r0110, r0130, r0230, r0240), (c0070, c0090)} >= 0 Our Proposal: the rule should be deactivated Reason: Marginal CVA-risk amounts can be negative due to portfolio effects   Mapping Pillar 3 disclosures templates with supervisory reporting (Template EU CMS2. Column d) Column d (RWEAs calculated using full standardised approach) shows the relevant Output-Floor S-TREA without Floor transitional rules according to CRR Article  465 (3) – (13). It is calculated as a surcharge of the current Output Floor S-TREA. But the values from Template C10.00  for transitional rules regarding  EXPOSURES SECURED BY MORTGAGES ON RESIDENTIAL PROPERTY are missing and must be included analogous to template EU CMS1 (à there: {C10.00, r0010, c0090} + {C10.00, r0010, c0100}).    EBA Validation rule v1659_m (C07.00) Current rule: {c0200} = {c0150} - {c0160} - ( 0.90 * {c0165}) - ( 0.8 * {c0170}) - ( 0.6 * {c0175}) - ( 0.5 * {c0180} - {c0195}) Proposal: {c0200} = {c0150} - {c0160} - ( 0.90 * {c0165}) - ( 0.8 * {c0170}) - ( 0.6 * {c0175}) - ( 0.5 * {c0180}) - {c0195} Reason: the term  {c0195} should be excluded from the 0.5-weight-bracket, because UCCs have under the transitional arrangement a 0% CCF and must be subtracted completely.   EBA Validation rule v6052_m (C 09.02) Current rule: {r0150} = {r0010} + {r0011} + {r0012} + {r0013} +{r0020} + {r0030} + {r0060} + {r0132} +{r0140} Proposal: {r0150} = {r0010} + {r0012} + {r0013} +{r0020} + {r0030} + {r0060} + {r0132} +{r0140} Reason: the "of which" position should not be part of the sum. 

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2021/451 – ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

Transfer of banking business – presentation of transaction in FINREP movements tables

An application for approval of the legal merger of Bank A with Bank B has been submitted to the Central Bank of Cyprus. The legal merger will be completed in two steps, (i) the transfer of banking business of Bank B to Bank A via a transfer of business agreement, (ii) the merger of the two entities via a scheme of reorganisation. Following step (i) of the merger, Bank B will not maintain any activities or deposits and it will surrender its banking license. As such it will cease to be a credit institution and will temporarily obtain ~36% of Bank A through the transfer of business to Bank A (subject to regulatory approvals). The said legal merger is expected to be effective from 1 July 2025 onwards. The first FINREP report that will be prepared for the “merged” entity will be for reference date 30/09/2025. Given the transaction described above, how should we approach the FINREP tables that show movements (i.e. tables F12.01, F12.02, F18.01, F24.01, F24.02, F25.01& F 25.03)? In our view, the possible options are as follows: (i) Opening balances comprise of the sum of the opening balances of both entities (prior to the transaction) as at 01/01/2025. Additions/disposals/other movements during the reference period are again the sum of the additions/disposals/other movements of the two entities. As such the transfer of balances from Bank B to Bank A will not be explicitly shown. (ii) Amounts transferred from Bank B to Bank A form part of the inflows/additions of the “merged” entity, meaning the opening balances on the movements tables present the figures as presented by Bank A in its current reporting.  (iii) Opening balances will be shown as nil and all will be shown as “Inflows”, as if a new entity is set up.

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2024/3117 - ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions

Validation Rule EBA_v22095 (tab J0200) : Duration

Could you please deactivate the validation rule EBA_v22095 for IRRBB reporting ? This validation rule checks that the sum of the modified durations for the sub-categories Retail, Wholesale Non-Financial, Wholesale Financial equals the modified duration of the Loans and Advances category. However, modified duration is not an additive measure.

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2021/451 – ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

Instructions for completing the register of information-Functions identification-Licenced activity

In the specifications of the DORA Register of Information file, in sheet B0601 for insurance and reinsurance undertakings, the list of values "List of possible values for all data fields with drop-downs (updated 3 March 2025)" appears, which does not include classes 17 ("Legal Expenses Insurance") and 18 ("Assistance"). Please inform us how these activities should be declared in the column "Licensed activity B06_01_0020".

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 2022/2554 (DORA Reg)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2024/2956 - ITS on the register of information

Exist a definition of information security standards

In DORA Article 28 (5), reference is made to "appropriate information security standards" and "of the most up-to-date and highest quality information security standards". Is There a definition of which standards are applicable here, or can credit institutions define the desired requirements themselves?"

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 2022/2554 (DORA Reg)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable