The U.K. Prudential Regulation Authority has published a draft modification of its capital rules to correspond with changes made to the Capital Requirements Regulation II that will apply directly in Member States from June 27, 2019. Firms wishing to benefit from the modified rules should apply to the Authorisations Division of the PRA.

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The Financial Stability Board has published a consultation paper on the effects of post-financial crisis regulatory reforms on financing for small- and medium-sized enterprises. The FSB’s analysis suggests that there have not been material or persistent negative effects on SME financing, although some evidence suggests the more stringent Basel III capital requirements may have slowed the pace and tightened the conditions of SME lending at the least capitalized banks.

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The legislative amendments to the EU's Capital Requirements Regulation and the Capital Requirements Directive, widely referred to as "CRD5" or "CRR2", have been published in the Official Journal of the European Union. Subject to certain exceptions, the Regulation amending CRR will apply directly across the EU from June 28, 2021. EU Member States are required to transpose the Directive amending CRD into their national laws and to apply those provisions from December 29, 2020, subject to certain exceptions.

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A new Directive amending the EU's Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive, widely referred to as "BRRD2", has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union.

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The European Systemic Risk Board's Advisory Scientific Committee has published a report on the risks of excessive regulatory complexity. The report considers the key drivers of regulatory complexity, the risks it entails and sets out seven principles designed to prioritize regulatory robustness, upon which it argues the design and reform of financial regulation should be based.

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The European Securities and Markets Authority has announced that it will launch a common supervisory action in the second half of 2019 on the application of the appropriateness requirements under the revised Markets in Financial Instruments Directive. The action will be undertaken as part of ESMA's mandate to build a culture of common supervision among EU national regulators.

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The Financial Stability Board has published two consultation papers on: (i) Public Disclosure of Resolution Planning and Resolvability; and (ii) Solvent Wind-down of Derivatives and Trading Portfolios. The first consultation paper focuses on disclosures made by financial institutions on their resolution planning and resolvability during “peace time” (i.e., times when there is no resolution commencing or in progress). The second consultation paper focuses on considerations that national regulators and global systemically important banks should take into account when commencing the solvent wind-down of a G-SIB’s derivative and trading book activities. 

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The European Money Markets Institute has adopted the EONIA working group's proposed methodology for calculating EONIA's replacement rate. The new methodology, dubbed "€STR" (or the "Euro short term rate"), will take effect as of October 2, 2019. In line with the adoption of the €STR, the European Central Bank has calculated the average risk spread between the new €STR and the existing EONIA rate as 0.0085% (8.5 basis points). The spread will be used for a limited period to calculate an adjusted EONIA rate for all existing contracts which continue to reference EONIA following the introduction of the €STR in October 2019.

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The Financial Stability Board has published a report on crypto-assets outlining the actions being undertaken by various international organizations in response to the challenges posed by crypto-assets and the FSB's own proposed course of action for the year ahead. The report will be delivered to G20 Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors at the next G20 meeting in Japan on June 8-9, 2019.

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The Financial Stability Board has published two reports as an update on the work to address correspondent banking declines - the "FSB Action Plan to Assess and Address the Decline in Correspondent Banking - Progress Report" and "Remittance Service Providers' Access to Banking Services: Monitoring of the FSB's Recommendations".

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A Commission Delegated Regulation specifying Regulatory Technical Standards on the applicable requirements for third party entities seeking authorization as providers of STS verification services has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union. The RTS supplement the Securitization Regulation (also known as the STS Regulation), which has applied directly across the EU since January 1, 2019. The Securitization Regulation provides the criteria for identifying which securitizations will be designated as "simple, transparent and standardized" (STS) securitizations and requires originators and sponsors to notify the European Securities and Markets Authority when a securitization meets the STS criteria. ESMA will maintain a list of all such securitizations on its website. The Securitization Regulation allows (but does not require) originators, sponsors and securitization special purpose entities to use third-party firms to assess whether a securitization meets the STS criteria, provided that those firms are authorized by the relevant national regulator. The new RTS set out what the application for authorization should cover, which includes information on the entities' organizational structure, operational safeguards and internal processes to assess STS compliance and conflicts of interest.

The RTS will apply directly across the EU from June 18, 2019.

View the RTS.

The European Banking Authority has published its annual report for 2018, setting out details of the work it undertook in 2018 and its focus areas in 2019. The EBA will, in 2019, focus on: (i) finalizing the guidelines on loan origination as part of its contribution to tackling non-performing loans in the EU; (ii) implementing the changes arising from the revised Capital Requirements Regulation, which was published in the Official Journal of the European Union on June 7, 2019; (iii) implementing the new Investment Firm Regulation and Directive by preparing various technical standards, guidelines and reports; (iv) preparing technical standards and guidelines, as required under the EU Securitization Regulation, that facilitate the use of internal models for banks investing in securitization positions; (v) assisting with the EU's implementation of Basel IV; (vi) the impact of FinTech, in particular, on payment institutions' and e-money institutions' business models; (vii) identifying regulatory and supervisory areas affected by the use of big data and developing best practices and principles for the application and implementation of data analytics by institutions; (viii) continuing to assess the risks of crypto-assets; (ix) supporting the European Commission's work on sustainable finance; and (x) improving the supervision of anti-money laundering and counter terrorism financing.

View the EBA's annual report 2018.

The European Banking Authority has published draft Implementing Technical Standards for supervisory reporting, which make changes to the existing reporting obligations of EU banks (credit institutions) and investment firms. The majority of the technical standards will apply from March 2020, with the exception of the liquidity coverage requirements, which will apply from April 2020.

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The European Commission has adopted draft Regulatory Technical Standards under the EU Securitization Regulation on the conditions for a securitization to be considered homogenous. Homogeneity is one of the requirements for a securitization to be classed as a simple, transparent and standardized securitization or STS securitization. Exposures related to STS securitizations will attract lower risk weightings for firms subject to the Capital Requirements Regulation. The new EU securitization framework has applied across the EU since January 1, 2019.

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The European Securities and Markets Authority has published a consultation paper in which it proposes amending the Implementing Technical Standards that specify the main indices and recognized exchanges for the purpose of the Capital Requirements Regulation (Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2016/1646). CRR requires a bank to hold sufficient capital to cover the risks associated with its business and prescribes how the credit risks of collateral should be treated. Securities that will be regarded as eligible as collateral are equities and convertible bonds that are constituents of a main index and debt securities that are listed on a recognized exchange. ESMA's consultation relates to the ITS setting out the main indices and recognized exchanges.

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The Financial Stability Board has begun its evaluation of the post-2008 financial crisis reforms on banks that were deemed "too big to fail", publishing the summary terms of reference. The evaluation will consider whether the implemented reforms are reducing the systemic and moral hazard risks associated with systemically important banks (or SIBs). The FSB is also asking for feedback from financial institutions and other stakeholders on the impact of these reforms. In particular, the FSB is seeking input on how the reforms have achieved their objectives, the impact of the reforms on SIBs, whether the impact differs for different types of banks, the impact of the reforms on financial system resilience and whether there are any unintended consequences of the reforms. The FSB asks those submitting responses to provide evidence, where possible. Responses should be submitted by June 21, 2019. The FSB intends to use the responses to prepare a draft report on the impact, which would be issued for consultation in June 2020. The final report is expected by the end of 2020.

View the summary terms of reference.

View the request for feedback.

The Joint Committee of European Supervisory Authorities has launched a consultation on draft Implementing Technical Standards on the reporting of intra-group transactions and risk concentration for financial conglomerates under the Financial Conglomerates Directive. FICOD sets out requirements for regulated entities to report at least annually all significant intra-group transactions of regulated entities within a financial conglomerate and for information sharing between relevant regulators of conglomerates.

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The European Banking Authority has published an Opinion opining that the prudential supervisory and regulatory requirements in Argentina are equivalent to the EU's requirements as set out in the Capital Requirements. The EBA provided its Opinion and formal assessment for Argentina to the Commission in November 2018. However, the documents have only now been published, at the request of the Commission. An equivalence decision for Argentina by the European Commission was published in the Official Journal of the European Union on April 1, 2019. The equivalence decision means that EU banks may apply preferential risk weights and hold less regulatory capital for their exposures to Argentinian banks, investment firms, clearing houses, CCPs, exchanges as well as the Argentinian government, central bank and public bodies, including any intragroup exposures of EU subsidiaries of Argentinian banks. Such an equivalence decision under CRR is one of the factors that a national regulator must take into account when deciding whether to adopt a domestic equivalence decision on consolidated supervision under the Capital Requirements Directive (i.e. whether to exercise consolidated supervision under EU rules to non-EU parents).

View the Opinion.

View the EBA's assessment.

View details of the equivalence decision for Argentina.

The Joint Committee of European Supervisory Authorities has published a Final Report and final draft amending Implementing Technical Standards on the mapping of External Credit Assessment Institutions' credit assessments under the Capital Requirements Regulation. The Joint Committee comprises the European Banking Authority, the European Securities and Markets Authority and the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority. The publication of the Final Report follows the consultation conducted by the ESAs between October 26, 2018 and December 31, 2018.

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The working group charged with implementing the European market's move away from EONIA, the current reference rate used in euro-denominated financial contracts, has published a consultation paper setting out its "Legal Action Plan" for transitioning to the chosen new euro short-term rate. The current consultation paper focuses on how the new rate should be incorporated into both new and existing financial contracts so as to ensure a swift and smooth transition from EONIA. The paper seeks feedback from market participants on its proposals. Responses should be sent by June 12, 2019.

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A report examining competition within the European syndicated loan market has been published, following a call by the European Commission for an examination of the sector. The report was prepared at the request of the Commission by consultancy firm Europe Economics with input from boutique competition law firm Euclid Law.

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The European Banking Authority has launched a consultation on the Regulatory Technical Standards that it is developing to govern certain aspects of counterparty credit risk in derivatives transactions. The EBA has been mandated to produce the RTS under the current draft of the Capital Requirements Regulation 2. The consultation runs until August 2, 2019. A public hearing will also take place at the EBA premises in Paris on June 17, 2019 from 15:00 - 17:00 CET. Parties interested in attending should register by May 28, 2019.

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The Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System has proposed amendments to Regulation EE, which implements the netting provisions of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation Improvement Act of 1991.  The proposed amendments would expand the definition of “financial institution” for purposes of the netting provisions to more clearly cover certain categories of entities and would clarify how the activities-based test under Regulation EE applies following the consolidation of legal entities.

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The Prudential Regulation Authority has released its first systemic risk buffer rates, which will apply from August 1, 2019. The rates determine the amount of additional regulatory capital which must be held by "systemic risk buffer institutions" (i.e. U.K. financial institutions which have been deemed to be systemically important). In scope firms are the so-called "ring-fenced bodies" within the meaning in the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 and include large building societies holding more than £25bn in deposits. The buffer applicable to each institution is intended to reflect the relative costs to the U.K. economy if the institution in question were to fall into distress.

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An EU Regulation amending the Capital Requirements Regulation introducing a statutory prudential backstop, and requiring banks to have minimum loan loss coverage for newly originated loans, has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union. The Amending Regulation is part of the package of legislative and non-legislative measures proposed by the European Commission in March 2018 to address remaining and future non-performing loans in the EU.

The Amending Regulation builds on existing CRR provisions, requiring a deduction from own funds where non-performing exposures are not sufficiently covered. The Amending Regulation establishes a set of conditions for the classification of NPLs, which builds on the existing framework in the existing Implementing Technical Standards on Supervisory Reporting. It also makes provision for different levels of stringency depending on whether an exposure is collateralized or not and on the reason for the classification of an exposure as non-performing. National regulators will be able to use their supervisory powers under the Capital Requirements Directive to address situations in which a bank's NPLs are insufficiently covered by the backstop.

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The Independent Evaluation Office (the Bank of England's independent review body) has published its evaluation of the BoE's approach to concurrent stress testing of the U.K. banking system. It concluded that overall the BoE has delivered on its stated approach and that the tests are valued highly by policymakers. The IEO has, however, outlined opportunities for refinement in three key areas, which the BoE has confirmed it is committed to implementing.

In the wake of the global financial crisis, the BoE reviewed its stress testing policy for the U.K. banking system and in 2015 published its approach to "concurrent" stress testing (the practice of simultaneously testing the entire balance sheets of several banks) up to 2018. The BoE's approach includes two scenarios: the annual cyclical scenario, a countercyclical scenario in which the severity of the scenario increases as risks build, and the biennial exploratory scenario, probing risks not linked to the financial cycle.

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The U.K. Prudential Regulation Authority has published a Policy Statement and related Supervisory Statement on enhancing banks’ and insurers’ approaches to managing the financial risks from climate change. The statements are in response to the PRA’s consultation paper published in 2018 which sought feedback on the draft Supervisory Statement. The Statements are relevant to all U.K. insurance and reinsurance firms, banks, building societies and PRA-designated investment firms.

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The European Securities and Markets Authority has published an updated version of its supervisory briefing on appropriateness. The original appropriateness briefing was published in December 2012 to provide guidance to EU national regulators on the appropriateness requirements under the original Markets in Financial Instruments Directive. The updated appropriateness briefing reflects the amended requirements introduced by the revised Directive or MiFID II and takes into account the new version of ESMA's suitability guidelines published in May 2018 to the extent they are relevant to the appropriateness rules.

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An equivalence decision on the prudential and regulatory requirements in Argentina has been published in the Official Journal of the European Union. The equivalence decision means that EU banks may apply preferential risk weights and hold less regulatory capital for their exposures to Argentinian banks, investment firms, clearing houses, CCPs and exchanges as well as the Argentinian government, central bank and public bodies. Such an equivalence decision under CRR is one of the factors that a national regulator must take into account when deciding whether to adopt a domestic equivalence decision on consolidated supervision under the Capital Requirements Directive (i.e. whether to exercise consolidated supervision under EU rules to non-EU parents).

View the equivalence decision.

The European Commission has published its latest progress report on building of the Capital Markets Union. The CMU is an EU initiative which aims to deepen and further integrate the capital markets of Member States, further safeguard financial stability, strengthen the international role of the euro and diversify sources of finances for small and medium enterprises. The CMU aims to allow consumers to buy cheaper and better investment products, and enable financial services providers to scale up by offering services in other Member States.

The progress report notes that the CMU is an important Single Market project that will give increased access to capital for both companies and citizens, especially in smaller countries. A well-developed CMU increases the EU’s attractiveness to foreign investment and complements the EU’s agenda of free and fair trade. Broadly, the Commission has delivered measures that it had committed to take forwards at the beginning of the mandate and put in place certain "building blocks" of the CMU. However, the report notes that it may take time for the impact of the Commission’s actions to be realized.

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The U.K. Prudential Regulation Authority has opened a consultation proposing changes to the Pillar 2 capital requirements for banks and large investment firms.

Responses to the consultation may be submitted until June 13, 2019. The PRA is proposing to implement the changes from October 1, 2019.

The Pillar 2 capital for firms comprises Pillar 2A and Pillar 2B. Pillar 2A is a firm's capital requirement for certain risks, including credit risk, market risk, operational risk, counterparty credit risk, credit concentration risk and interest rate risk in the non-trading book. Pillar 2B is the PRA's buffer for each firm, in addition to the buffers required under the Capital Requirements Directive. The PRA's proposals relate to changes needed to its approach to setting the Pillar 2B buffer as a result of the Bank of England's changes to the stress testing framework. The proposals also aim to: (i) clarify the PRA's approach to assessing weaknesses in risk management and governance under Pillar 2B; and (ii) explain the process for updating the benchmarks used to calculate the Pillar 2A requirement for credit risk.

The changes would be implemented by updates to:

• Statement of Policy, "The PRA's methodologies for setting Pillar 2 capital";
• Supervisory Statement, "The Internal Capital Adequacy Assessment Process (ICAAP) and the Supervisory Review and Evaluation Process (SREP)" (SS31/15); and
• Supervisory Statement, "Implementing CRD IV: Capital buffers" (SS6/14).

View the consultation paper.

The Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority have published press releases following the first meeting of the Climate Financial Risk Forum on March 8, 2019. The CFRF is a joint forum established by the PRA and FCA in late 2018. The CFRF aims to encourage financial sector approaches towards managing the financial risks from climate change as well as supporting green finance. The CFRF will develop practical tools and approaches to reduce the barriers for firms looking to adopt a strategy for minimizing financial risks from climate change. The regulators are concerned with both the impact of climate change itself and the transition to supporting a low carbon economy. Both the FCA and the PRA consulted in late 2018 on the impact of climate change. The PRA consulted on a draft Supervisory Statement on managing the financial risks from climate change and the FCA consulted on climate change and green finance and the potential changes to its regulatory approach to these issues. The FCA consultation set out specific actions that the FCA intends to take in the short term in four areas - capital markets disclosures, public reporting requirements, green finance and pensions.

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The U.K. Prudential Regulation Authority has published final rules and an updated Supervisory Statement alongside a Policy Statement on the definition of default for credit risk. The EU Capital Requirements Regulation's risk quantification provisions set out that a default occurs when an obligor is past due more than 90 days on any material credit obligation to a firm, its parent or any of its subsidiaries. The materiality of the credit commitment is to be assessed against a threshold set by the national regulator according to its view of a reasonable level of risk.

The European Banking Authority developed a roadmap in 2016 to address concerns about the variability of own funds requirements arising from the internal models that firms use to calculate their minimum credit risk capital requirements under the CRR. The PRA is adopting a two-stage approach to implementing the EBA's roadmap. This first stage concerns the definition of default. The PRA will consult later on implementation of the second stage on PD and LGD estimation, once the EBA's regulatory products on this topic have been finalized.

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The European Banking Authority has published a report and final Guidelines on the estimation of LGD appropriate for an economic downturn in compliance with the Capital Requirements Regulation, the Regulatory Technical Standards on the internal ratings-based assessment methodology and the final draft RTS on the specification of an economic downturn.

The Guidelines will apply from January 1, 2021 and firms should incorporate these requirements in their rating systems by that time. However, national regulators may bring forward, at their discretion, this deadline. The EBA Guidelines remind firms that the use of own estimates of LGD appropriate for an economic downturn is subject to approval by their home state regulator.

The Guidelines specify how LGD estimates appropriate for an economic downturn - identified in accordance with the draft RTS on economic downturn - should be quantified, taking into account the specificities of firm processes, underwriting standards and general response to adverse economic conditions. The Guidelines supplement the existing EBA Guidelines on Probability of Default, LGD estimation and treatment of defaulted assets.

The publication of these Guidelines marks the completion of the EBA's 2016 roadmap, designed to address concerns about the variability of own funds requirements arising from the internal models that firms use to calculate their minimum credit risk capital requirements under the CRR.

View the final report and guidelines.

View details of the EBA's consultation on the guidelines.

On February 27-28^th, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision met to discuss policy and supervisory issues, and the extent to which members had implemented post-financial crisis reforms.

The Committee noted the implementation status of margin requirements for uncleared derivatives and it will publish in March a joint statement with the International Organization of Securities Commissions on certain implementation aspects of margin requirements.

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The European Banking Authority has published a consultation paper concerning proposed guidelines on credit risk mitigation for firms using the advanced internal ratings based approach with own estimates for loss given default. The consultation follows the EBA's report on the CRM framework, published in March 2018, which should be read in conjunction with the consultation paper. Responses to the consultation should be submitted by May 25, 2019. 

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The European Banking Authority has published revised Guidelines on outsourcing arrangements. The guidelines are intended to update and replace outsourcing guidelines issued in 2006 (by the EBA's predecessor, the Committee of European Banking Supervisors) on outsourcing by credit institutions. The EBA Guidelines have a wider scope, applying to all financial institutions that are within the scope of the EBA's mandate, namely credit institutions and investment firms subject to the Capital Requirements Directive, as well as payment institutions and electronic money institutions. The investment firms within scope, provided that the new Investment Firm Regulation and Directive and related changes to CRD and the Capital Requirements Regulation have entered into force, will only be the largest investment firms (Class 1 Investment Firms). The Guidelines also integrate the recommendation on outsourcing to cloud service providers that was published by the EBA in December 2017. Both the 2006 guidelines and the December 2017 recommendations will be repealed when these new Guidelines enter into force.

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The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision has completed the review of its 2008 Principles for sound liquidity risk management and supervision. The Basel Committee has concluded that the Principles do not require revision. The Committee expects both supervisors and banks to remain attentive to liquidity risks in the financial markets. Banks should take into account developments since 2008 that may impact their liquidity risk management considerations. These developments include, for example, increasing digitisation of finance and payment systems, an increased use of central clearing of derivatives and margining and the increasing significance of cyber-attacks.

View the announcement.

View the 2008 Principles.

The Eurozone Single Resolution Board has published the second wave of its 2018 minimum requirements for own funds and eligible liabilities as part of resolution planning required under the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive and related Single Resolution Mechanism Regulation. The SRB published the first wave of the 2018 MREL requirements in November which applied to banks that did not have binding MREL targets in 2017. 

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Following its consultation from March to June last year, the Basel Committee on Banking Standards has announced the final revisions to the Basel III market risk capital framework. At the same time, it has also announced its 2019 priorities.

The objective of the Basel market risk framework is to ensure that banks hold enough regulatory capital to protect against losses arising from movements in market prices of instruments held in their trading book. Certain changes to the 2016 market risk framework are to:
 

1. Clarify the scope of application. The Committee has provided further guidance on the regulatory book to which instruments should be assigned in circumstances where instruments could go into more than one book and has revised the treatment of structural foreign currency positions. The revised framework also allows equity investments in funds to be allocated to the trading book, provided that a bank: (i) is able to "look through" to the fund's underlying assets; or (ii) has access both to daily price quotes and to the information contained in the mandate of the fund.
2. Revise the internal model approach to address implementation challenges, in particular, by amending the profit and loss attribution (PLA) test metric and failure consequence.
3. Amend the standardized model approach. The approach to measuring risk factor losses was too high in relation to the actual risk and there was unnecessary operational burden. The changes in the standardized approach include widening the scope of currency pairs that are considered liquid in the FX risk class to ensure more currency pairs are subject to lower risk weights and introducing new "index" buckets for equity and credit spread risks so that each underlying position in an index does not need to be identified.

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The U.K. Prudential Regulation Authority has launched a consultation on proposed amendments to its Supervisory Statement on credit risk mitigation to clarify its expectations around the eligibility of financial collateral. The consultation paper is relevant for banks, building societies and PRA-designated U.K. investment firms that are subject to the Capital Requirements Regulation. The consultation closes on April 10, 2019.

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The European Banking Authority has published a press release calling for firms to take more action in their Brexit-related communications with customers. The U.K. will depart the EU without a transitional period on March 30, 2019 if the withdrawal agreement is not ratified by that time. In June 2018, the EBA issued an Opinion that stressed the need for firms to consider their obligations to existing and prospective customers. It set out a list of minimum information that national regulators should ensure firms send to customers whose contracts or services might be affected by the end of the year. In its press release, the EBA urges firms to consider the June 2018 Opinion and to communicate to customers the risks and effects that a no-deal Brexit may have on a customer's contract with the firm.

View the press release.

View details of the EBA's June 2018 Opinion.

The European Banking Authority has published two sets of finalized guidelines under the Securitization Regulation which, along with targeted amendments to the Capital Requirements Regulation, forms part of the new EU Securitization Framework for simple, transparent and standardized securitizations from January 2019. Originators and sponsors will be required to notify the European Securities and Markets Authority of any securitization that meets the STS criteria to be able to use the "STS" designation. ESMA will maintain a list of all such securitizations on its website.

Read more.

The U.K. Securitization Regulations 2018 have been laid before Parliament and will come into force on January 1, 2019. The Regulations implement the EU Securitization Regulation (also known as the STS Regulation) into U.K. law.

The EU Securitization Regulation provides the criteria for identifying which securitizations will be designated as simple, transparent and standardized securitizations, a system to monitor the application of those criteria and common requirements on risk retention, due diligence and disclosure. It also allows (but does not require) originators, sponsors and securitization special purpose entities to use third-party firms to assess whether a securitization meets the STS criteria, provided that those firms are authorized by the relevant national regulator. Originators, sponsors or original lenders of a securitization will be required to retain on an ongoing basis a material net economic interest in the securitization of at least 5%. Related amendments to the Capital Requirements Regulation set out preferential regulatory treatment for investors, in particular, for bank investors, of their exposures to securitizations that are deemed to be STS securitizations.

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The European Supervisory Authorities have issued a joint statement addressing two issues arising from the Securitization Regulation. The Securitization Regulation will apply directly across the EU from January 1, 2019 to securities issued under securitizations on or after January 1, 2019. Securitizations issued before that date may be referred to as STS securitizations, provided that they meet certain conditions.

The first issue addressed in the joint statement relates to disclosure requirements for EU securitizations. The Securitization Regulation requires originators and sponsors to notify ESMA of any securitization that meets the "Simple, Transparent and Standardized" criteria. ESMA will maintain a list of all such securitizations on its website. Securitization special purpose entities, originators and sponsors of a securitization will be required to make certain information available via a securitization repository to holders of a securitization position, to the national regulators and, upon request, to potential investors. The European Securities and Markets Authority and the European Commission still have to address a number of market concerns on the proposed ESMA disclosure templates (that will be introduced as Technical Standards under the Regulation) as part of these transparency requirements. This is a process that will not be concluded by January 1, 2019.

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Central bankers and banking supervisors from over eighty jurisdictions met this week in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates to discuss a range of policy and supervisory topics.

On November 26-27, 2018 there was a meeting of the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision at which it was agreed that a consultation would take place next year to discuss a framework to consolidate the Committee's standards into a single integrated structure. Moreover, a number of items were agreed:

• A set of targeted revisions to the market risk framework which is due to be implemented by January 1, 2022.
• A consultation on potential enhanced disclosures to reduce bank window-dressing behaviour related to leverage ratio will be pursued. The Basel Committee issued a statement in October declaring unacceptable the alleged tendency in banks to engage in so-called window-dressing by temporarily reducing transaction volumes around key reference dates, which has supposedly the effect of allowing banks to report and publicly disclose better leverage ratios.
• A set of revisions to the Pillar 3 disclosure framework will be published in December.
• A report will be published in December setting out the range of bank, regulatory and supervisory cyber-resilience practices across jurisdictions.

View the press release.

View details of the Basel Committee's consultation on the revised market risk framework.

The Financial Conduct Authority has published a report entitled "Cyber and Technology Resilience: Themes from cross-sector survey 2017-2018." The FCA compiled the report by requesting 296 firms during 2017 and 2018 to provide a self-assessment of their cyber and technological capabilities, focusing on governance, delivery of change management, managing third-party risks and the effectiveness of cyber defenses. The FCA analyzed the responses and considered data from firm's responses to recent operational incidents to produce the report.

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The U.K. Treasury Committee has announced the launch of a new Inquiry into IT failures in the financial services sector. The Inquiry has been launched in response to recent IT failures at a number of financial institutions that have led to consumers being unable to access their bank accounts or becoming subject to fraud.

The Committee will assess the causes and consequences of these recent IT failures. Among other things, the Committee will consider the extent to which such incidents are becoming more frequent, sources of concentration risk in the financial sector, the impact of legacy IT systems, the effect of outsourcing on operational resilience, best practices in responding to operational incidents and whether the U.K. regulators are able to regulate firms' capabilities for responding to such incidents.

Written submissions can be made to the Committee by January 18, 2019. The Committee will also appoint a special advisor to provide policy advice to the Committee on the issues. Individuals interested in the role should respond to the call for Expressions of Interest.

View the announcement.

The U.K. Prudential Regulation Authority has published a consultation paper entitled "The systemic risk buffer: Updates to the Statement of Policy," proposing minor updates to its Statement of Policy, "The PRA’s approach to the systemic risk buffer." The consultation is relevant to "SRB institutions," which are: (i) ring-fenced bodies within the meaning in the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000; or (ii) large building societies that hold more than £25 billion in deposits (where one or more of the account holders is a small business) and shares (excluding deferred shares).
 
The PRA proposes to amend the Statement of Policy to:
 

• remove the statement that the PRA’s approach to reviewing the SoP every two years is mandated by the SRB regulations;
• replace references to the PRA's April 2018 consultation, "The PRA’s methodologies for setting Pillar 2 capital," with references to the finalized Statement of Policy that was subsequently published; and
• include references to the PRA's Supervisory Statement, "UK leverage ratio framework," that was recently updated to apply an additional leverage ratio buffer rate to SRB institutions.

 
As the proposals are of only a minor nature, the consultation period is short and comments on the consultation paper are invited by December 6, 2018.
 
View the consultation paper (PRA CP 29/18).
 
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The Eurozone Single Resolution Board has published its 2018 Policy Statement for firms’ minimum requirements for own funds and eligible liabilities under the first wave of 2018 resolution plans to be adopted under the Bank Recovery and Resolution Directive. The SRB is responsible for ensuring the compliance of Eurozone banks that are subject to the Single Resolution Mechanism (primarily Eurozone countries) with the Single Resolution Mechanism Regulation and BRRD. As part of this function, the SRB works with national regulators to determine relevant institutions’ MREL requirements. The purpose of the Policy Statement is to provide clarity for Eurozone banks on the SRB’s determination of 2018 MREL targets.

Read more.