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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

Outflows on other liabilities for Operational Accounts (Basel para 93 -104)

a. CRR in addition to clearing, custody and cash management CRR considers “other comparable services” eligible for a 5% run off. Are correspondent banking and prime brokerage services included in the definition? b. How does one prove that the client is unable to withdraw without compromising client’s operational functioning over a 30 day horizon? c. How often do you need to check if an account is meeting the criteria for operational accounts?

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

Reporting of collateral swaps

We do not understand how collateral swaps should be integrated in the reporting template. o Indeed, to calculate the inflows / outflows concerning reverse repos and repos, there should theoretically be a cap on the difference between the cash value of the operation and the market value of underlying security. To calculate the inflows / outflows generated by collateral swaps, the same kind of calculation should be done, but without the cap. o Since operationally the same cells should be used to integrate repos / reverse repos and collateral swaps in the EBA template, we do not understand how this can give adequate results in terms of LCR ratio calculation.

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) No 680/2014 - ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

Treatment of cash collateral

What is the treatment in LCR and NSFR of cash collateral given or received in derivative transactions?

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

Definition of a "material penalty" and "individually justified circumstances"

What is the definition of a "material penalty" and "individually justified circumstances"? Who will be the final arbiter in determining the “materiality” of the penalty for early withdrawal within 30 days?

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

Member States government bonds

Can the EBA confirm that all Member States government bonds are defined as liquid assets and not excluded if their credit quality is low e.g. would Greek government debt be eligible currently? It is our understanding where you have foreign currency liabilities they can be matched with sovereign bonds in that currency. But in the EU are all Euro sovereign bonds equally eligible as liquid assets or do they need to fulfil also the eligibility criteria in Art 416 (1) (b)?

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

Minimum reserve requirement

What is the requirement to maintain the minimum reserve requirement within the LCR period, i.e. does the LCR have to be met for each of the 30 days in the stress horizon?

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

CIUs

Where an institution consists of a parent bank and two subsidiaries does the EUR 500 million cap on CIUs apply to consolidated group or can it apply to each of the legal entities? In the latter case this would imply the consolidated group could count up to EUR 1500 million CIU.

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

Repurchase and cancellation of Tier 2 in the open market less than 5 years from issue

Can you please confirm if Article 78(4) is meant to apply only to the redemption of T2 securities within 5 years of issuance (as specified in the terms and conditions of the instrument), or if it also prohibits the use of liability management exercises to repurchase (and cancellation) T2 notes at market levels within 5 years of the issuance.

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

Definition of threshold

Definition of threshold. Should bonds be considered in the calculation of the 1mln/€ threshold?

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

Definition of retail deposits.

Can the EBA confirm that retail bonds (both retail and small business) can be treated as retail deposits?

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

Reporting frequency for template C17.00 Op risk details

Please elaborate which reporting period that should be included in the semi-annual reporting of template C017.00. According to the Annex II, part 4.2 paragraph 119 this template summarises the information by an institution in the last year. If it should be reported with a semi-annual report, which reporting period should then be included in the reporting as per end Dec resp. end June? Possible way to read this: - The same figures should be reported twice a year (just as template C16.00 contains the same figure for four quarters in row). - Rolling 12 month reporting (i.e. as per end June is 1/7 the previous year until 30/6 the reporting year)

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) No 680/2014 - ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

Assets controlled by a liquidity management function

Would only those assets which are directly controlled by the liquidity management function fall within the definition of liquid asset holdings (subject to meeting the other conditions) under Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR), or do those assets which are not directly controlled by the liquidity management function also qualify?

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

Treatment of repos and reverse repos collateralised by commodities

The current guidance for Section 1.6 of the reporting template, Monies due from secured lending and capital market driven transactions as defined in Article 192, contains the following statement: 'Therefore, any transaction in which the institution has provided a collateralised loan in cash, such as reverse repurchase transactions as defined in Article 4(59) of Regulation (EU) No 575/2013, expiring within 30 days, shall be reported in this section'. The ITS guidance states that this section relates to rows 120-930, however we not believe that these rows contain categories that cover the treatment of repos and reverse repos collateralised by commodities stocks such as aluminium, nickel, carbon credits etc. Clarification is therefore needed on the reporting of such transactions.

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) No 680/2014 - ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

Reporting of repos and reverse repos with underlying liquid asset collateral

Clarification on the reporting of repos and reverse repos with underlying collateral which is eligible for inclusion in the liquid asset buffer is needed. In particular, CRR Article 416 allows for unencumbered assets obtained through reverse repo transactions to be included within the pool of liquid assets and greater clarity is needed therefore on how these should be reported on C51.00 and C53.00.

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) No 680/2014 - ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

Value adjustments for prudent valuation (Additional Value Adjustments)

Article 34 of Regulation (EU) No. 575/2013 (CRR) requires institutions to apply a deduction from CET1 the amount of any additional value adjustments on all assets measured at fair value calculated in accordance with Article 105. Article 105(14) of the CRR specifies that the EBA shall submit draft regulatory technical standards to the Commission by 28 July 2013 (as per CRR corrigendum published on 2 August 2013). In this regard the EBA published a draft consultation paper (EBA/CP/2013/28) whereby it is specified that "as a consequence of the EBA decision to conduct a QIS, the EBA currently envisages to finalise the technical standard in Q2 2014". Therefore it is not clear as concerns the first reporting date on Q12014 whether institutions must: 1) not apply the prudential filter (i.e. the relative reporting item shall be valued zero) until the publication of the final EBA RTS 2) calculate the prudential filter in accordance with the Basel II framework (i.e. requirements for prudent valuation defined by each local regulator) 3) calculate the prudential filter in accordance with the draft EBA standards as defined in consultation paper EBA/CP/2013/28

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

Continuation of current liquidity waivers

Clarification is needed as to the interim arrangements pending the introduction of the waiver/group treatments provided for under Article 8 of Regulation (EU) No. 575/2013 (CRR).

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

Use of Core Market Participants Rule

This question regards the use of the Core Market Participants rule (Article 227 of Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)) in the context of Master Netting Agreements with Own Estimates of Volatility (Article 220). The rule detailed under Article 227 of CRR specifically excludes only the Internal Models Approach for Master Netting Agreements (Article 221), and is consistent with the Basel II text (June 2006) in which paragraph 170 excludes the same approach in paragraphs 178-181. However, paragraph 177 of the June 2006 text provides for repo-style transactions under master netting agreements to have haircuts calculated in accordance with paragraphs 147-172, inclusive of the core market participant rules. This is in contrast to the CRR, where article 220(1) is only inclusive of the volatility adjustments detailed in Articles 223-226, thereby excluding the core market participant rule. The question is whether this exclusion in the final CRR was intentional or an oversight.

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

Holdings of own funds instruments issued by financial sector entities included in the scope of consolidated supervision not deducted from own funds on an individual basis

According to Article 49(2) of Regulation (EU) No. 575/2013 (CRR) “for the purposes of calculating own funds on an individual basis and a sub-consolidated basis, institutions subject to supervision on a consolidated basis in accordance with Chapter 2 of Title II of Part One shall not deduct holdings of own funds instruments issued by financial sector entities included in the scope of consolidated supervision, unless the competent authorities determine those deductions to be required for specific purposes, in particular structural separation of banking activities and resolution planning. Such provisions mean, if understood correctly, that starting from 1 January 2014, all significant investments in financial entities of a bank subgroup will not be deducted from own funds on an individual basis, but according to Article 49(4) of the CRR will be risk weighted according to Article 133 (for standardised approach). With the above in mind, what risk weight should be applied for such exposures? According to Article 133(2) of the CRR “equity exposures shall be assigned a risk weight of 100 %, unless they are required to be deducted in accordance with Part Two, assigned a 250 % risk weight in accordance with Article 48(4), assigned a 1250 % risk weight in accordance with Article 89(3) or treated as high risk items in accordance with Article 128.” In Article 133(2) of the CRR there is no reference to equity exposures treated under Article 49(2). Does this mean that such exposures should be treated simply with 100% risk weight?

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

January and February 2014 figures for the Q1 2014 leverage ratio reporting

Does the leverage ratio Q1 2014 reporting should include January 2014 and February 2014 data

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) No 680/2014 - ITS on supervisory reporting of institutions (repealed)

Risk Retention

Can the retention requirements under Article 405 of Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR) be satisfied by the provider of the junior/first loss funding for a CLO warehouse where such an entity has also been involved in the selection of the exposures and the setting of criteria, as it can be said, in such capacity, to be acting as "originator"? Also, where the warehouse provides financing for the acquisition of the majority of the exposures but further exposures are acquired from different sources after closing (and in accordance with pre-defined criteria), will this prevent the first loss warehouse provider from being the "originator"?

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