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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

QUALIFICATION OF INVESTMENT IN FOREIGN TRADING SUBSIDIARY

Could the EBA confirm that a long position in foreign currency, say in USD (while the Bank’s reporting currency is EUR), stemming only from the Bank’s investment in a trading subsidiary in the US, can be qualified as structural?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: EBA/GL/2020/09 - Guidelines on the treatment of structural FX under Article 352(2) of CRR

QUALIFICATION OF INTERNAL TRANSACTIONS AS "STRUCTURAL"

When considering internal financing in currencies between the Bank’s prudential banking book (“BB”) and the trading book (“TB”), aiming at balancing the balance sheet of both BB and TB, we would be keen to know whether the “banking book leg” of such refinancing could be eligible to the exemption pursuant to art. 352(2) CRR? In particular, could such positions be assumed to hedge/incentivize the CET1 ratio against changes in FX rates while they stem from internal financings between the BB and the TB of the same entity? Could such positions be assumed to be structural?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: EBA/GL/2020/09 - Guidelines on the treatment of structural FX under Article 352(2) of CRR

Population of Current Market Values for SFTs which are subject to exposure calculations under Chapter 4

The guidance for c0040 and c0050 of template C 34.02 specifies that these should be populated with the 'sum of the current market values (CMV) of all the netting sets with positive [or negative respectively] CMV as defined in Article 272(12) CRR'. Article 272(12) CRR then states 'Current Market Value‧ (hereinafter referred to as 'CMV') for the purposes of Section 5 refers to the net market value of the portfolio of transactions within a netting set, where both positive and negative market values are used in computing the CMV'.It is unclear how to populate these rows for SFTs when there is ineligible collateral under Chapter 4 included within the value of an otherwise legally enforceable netting agreement. 

  • 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

Clarification of scope of population for Corporate Bonds

In accordance with the instructions for row 0060 of template C 34.08 in Annex II of Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2021/451, there is no specific definition of what the scope of corporate bonds should include. Could you, therefore, please confirm if this should include all bonds issued by Institutions and Corporate entities and if it would also include securitisation bonds issued by these entities as well or not or, alternatively, would only non-securitisation instruments issued by entities which would qualify for the corporates credit risk exposure class under Article 112(g) of the CRR be included? We would also request clarification on securitisation bonds, whether those issued by government agencies e.g., Fannie Mae should be reported in row 0050.

  • 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

Incorrect validation rules related to Funding Plan

We observed that the following validation rules are causing error in submission to NBB Onegate via dissemination exchange and thus being refused to be accepted in the system. 1) eba_v6230_m 2) eba_v08995_m 3) eba_v08991_m

  • 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

Eligibility of communication by AISPs with ASPSP throughout interface used for authentication and communication with the ASPSP's payment services users in case of ASPSP’s exemption from the fall back mechanism

Question no 1:   Does a fact, that based on art. 33(6) RTS, given ASPSP was granted by competent authority with exclusion from the obligation to set up the contingency mechanism described under art. 33(4) RTS, means, that such exemption merely gives this ASPSP a right not to set up the contingency mechanism, and hence, this is up to ASPSP to enjoy and to follow this exclusion, or whether, in opposition, this exemption creates on ASPSP side obligation to bring this exclusion to life.   Question no 2:   Does a fact, that given ASPSP was granted by competent authority with exclusion from the obligation to set up the contingency mechanism described under art. 33(4) RTS, creates on AISP’s end any kind of obligation, for instance lack of right to communicate with ASPSP in question throughout interface made available to the payment service users for the authentication and communication with their ASPSPs.

  • Legal act: Directive 2015/2366/EU (PSD2)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2018/389 - RTS on strong customer authentication and secure communication

Eligibility of communication by AISPs with ASPSP throughout two access interfaces in parallel

Question no 1: Do art. 30(1), art. 31 and art. 33 of the Commision Delegated Regulation (EU) 2018/389 of 27 November 2017 supplementing Directive (EU) 2015/2366 of the European Parliament and of the Council with regard to regulatory technical standards for strong customer authentication and common and secure open standards of communication (”RTS”) should be interpreted in that manner, that in scenario, where account servicing payment service provider (”ASPSP”) has introduced a so-called dedicated interface within a meaning of art. 31 RTS, which meets requirements provided for in art. 32 and 33 RTS, than ASPSP has a right and it is up to ASPSP’s sole discretion, whether, for purposes of communication with account information service providers (”AISPs”), to: make available to AISPs, in parallel, two access interfaces, as referred to in art. 31 RTS (i.e. dedicated interface and interface made available to the payment service users for the authentication and communication with their ASPSPs); or make available to AISPs only dedicated interface (without prejudice to, among others, contingency measures set forth in art. 33 RTS)? Question no 2: If answer to question no 1 is that in scenario of introduction by ASPSP of dedicated interface, ASPSP has a right and it is up to ASPSP’s sole discretion to make available to AISPs, in parallel, two access interfaces, as referred to in art. 31 RTS (i.e. dedicated interface and interface made available to the payment service users for the authentication and communication with their ASPSPs), does this mean that AISPs, with observation of further requirements set forth in art. 30, art. 34 and art. 35 RTS, might communicate with this ASPSP, in parallel, throughout both access interfaces? Question no 3: If answer to question no 1 is that in scenario of introduction by ASPSP of dedicated interface, ASPSP has no right and it is not up to ASPSP’s sole discretion to make available to AISPs, in parallel, two access interfaces, as referred to in art. 31 RTS, i.e. a contrario ASPSP is allowed to make available to AISPs only dedicated interface (without prejudice to, among others, contingency measures set forth in art. 33 RTS), does ASPSP is under obligement to engange necessary and proportional measures, including technical measures, for AISPs to communicate with ASPSP only via dedicated interface, i.e. with exclusion of interface made available to the payment service users for the authentication and communication with their ASPSPs? Question no 4: If answer to question no 1 is that in scenario of introduction by ASPSP of dedicated interface, ASPSP has no right and it is not up to ASPSP’s sole discretion to make available to AISPs, in parallel, two access interfaces, as referred to in art. 31 RTS, i.e. a contrario ASPSP is allowed to make available to AISPs only dedicated interface (without prejudice to, among others, contingency measures as set forth in art. 33 RTS) but nevertheless ASPSP has not engange necessary and proportional measures, including technical measures, for AISPs to communicate with ASPSP only via dedicated interface, i.e. with exclusion of interface made available to the payment service users for the authentication and communication with their ASPSPs, does this fact in any measure reflects AISPs right to communicate with this ASPSP throughout both access interfaces, or whether AISPs should undertake any additional actions, and if yes, what kind of actions?

  • Legal act: Directive 2015/2366/EU (PSD2)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Regulation (EU) 2018/389 - RTS on strong customer authentication and secure communication

Validation error v4390_s

Validation rule v4390_s does not allow the reporting of negative amounts in F01.01 for all row items. We report however a negative amount in the Funding Plan reporting under 'other assets' (F01.01 row 211) which is due to a negative amount in the FINREP reporting under 'Fair value changes of the hedged items in portfolio hedge of interest rate risk' (F01.01 row 250) which is due to the application of IAS 39 89A (a). Can the validation rule be adapted, or guidance be provided with regard to the treatment in case of a negative amount in the FINREP reporting under 'Fair value changes of the hedged items in portfolio hedge of interest rate risk' (F01.01 row 250)?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: EBA/GL/2019/05 – Guidelines on harmonised definitions and templates for funding plans of credit institutions under Recommendation A4 of ESRB/2012/2 - repealing EBA/GL/2014/04

requirements for professional experience of representatives and board members of EMIs

Dear Sir/Madam,    In the process of licensing an EMI, the management of the company aplying for a licese is required to have certain professional qualifications: experience, clean record, good reputation,etc... As PSD2 does not regulate this topic, each National Bank has set different requirments. The same pereon may be elidgible under the requirments of central bank of one country while not elidgible for another. Usually, the requirments are for banking and equivalent proffesional background and experience.  Profesionals with technology background (eg. Computer Science, blockchain, software development, AI, information management) are not elidgible. However technology is one of the main drivers of innovation and competitiveness in both banks and fintech.    In this regard, I have two questions:  1. Is EBA discussing any harmonisation of requirments for profesional experience of managing teams of EMIs to be enforced in a new updated PSD2? 2. If yes, does EBA consider allowing technology related profesionals to hold management possitions in EMIs?    Best regards,  Filip Mutafis  

  • Legal act: Directive 2015/2366/EU (PSD2)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Central bank eligibility of cash

Should cash be reported as central bank eligible in F 32.01 (AE-ASS) if a bank can borrow securities against cash from the central bank?

  • 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

Treasury shares – how to report them in Own Funds and in the NSFR

In CA1 (own funds), should treasury shares (holdings of own shares that were bought back with the prior permission from the CA) be reported in as ‘(-) Direct holdings of CET1 instruments’ (row 80) or should they be reported as part of the ‘Accumulated other comprehensive income’ (row 180) or ‘Other reserves’ (row 200) if they are already included in one of these accounts according to the accounting rules? In case treasury shares are to be reported as a deduction in row 80 in CA1 (hence this deduction is reversed in the NSFR own funds - see Q&A 2021_6016), should treasury shares require any stable funding?

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

PD calibration sample

Given the definition of PD calibration provided in EBA/GL/2017/16 section 2.4 paragraph 8, and the requirements for the calibration sample provided in section 5.3.5, paragraph 88 of the same guidelines, for developing a TTC model, clarification is needed on the expectation on the implementation of the back-testing performed in the validation phase.: Shall the back-testing at portfolio level verify that the average PD over historical observation period is aligned with LRA DR or, instead, shall the comparison be made between PD estimates current at the validation date and the LRA DR? Does it change according to the rating philosophy? Shall the back-testing always be performed on a 1-year validation sample, regardless the type of TTC calibration philosophy and regardless the length of the calibration sample? How shall the rating philosophy be taken into consideration when assessing the outcome of back-testing at grade level? Provided that the main aim of the calibration is to reflect the LRA DR, is the any case where the alignment to 1-year default rate should get a higher weight in validation assessment, although in a TTC calibration philosophy?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: EBA/GL/2017/16 - Guidelines on PD estimation, LGD estimation and the treatment of defaulted exposures

Correlation parameter for Intra-bucket correlations for credit spread risk for non-securitisations

In the first subparagraph of Article 325m of Regulation (EU) No 575/2013 (CRR) it is stated that institutions apply a risk factor per issuer and per maturity, irrespective of whether these credit spread rates of the issuer derive from debt instruments or credit default swaps. However, the correlation factor linked to the basis risk is present in article 325ai of (CRR). Must this value always be equal to 1 since there is no longer a division between the two types of curve as regards risk factors or does this basis risk refer to another type of risk? In this second case to which?

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

Back-to-Back in regulatory threshold

How should back-to-back trades that net off perfectly when calculating the size of their on- and off-balance-sheet business that is subject to market risk be accounted for? Should both positions be considered in absolute value, both the short and the long position, or should they not be included as the positions perfectly offset each other and do not generate capital requirements for market risk?

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

Service Downtime

The question refers to the case that an incident with a duration of two hours that disrupts transaction processing occurs around the daily cut off time of same-day transactions processing. Thus, the incident may be of a short duration, but as a result, transactions are booked one day later. Considering this example, what service downtime should the payment service provider (PSP) indicate in the PSD2 notification? Just the net time of the failure or the total time any payment service users are affected by delayed transactions, i.e. one day?

  • Legal act: Directive 2015/2366/EU (PSD2)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: EBA/GL/2021/03 - Guidelines on major incident reporting under PSD2 - repealing EBA/GL/2017/10

Application of the retention requirements to situations where the retained exposure is transferred to a third-party after losses associated with the relevant exposure

Can a retention holder under Article 6(3)(c) (so-called random selection) of Regulation (EU) 2402/2017 (“Securitisation Regulation”) transfer the retained exposure to a third party if the transfer occurs after crystallisation on the retention holder’s accounts of the losses associated with the relevant exposure?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 2017/2402 (SecReg)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Risk retention obligation in case of voluntary liquidation of an Alternative investment fund (“AIF”) acting as retention holder under Article 6(3) of the Securitisation Regulation

Assuming an alternative investment fund (“AIF”) set up to disburse loans to be subsequently securitised acts as retention holder under Article 6(3) of Regulation (EU) 2402/2017 (hereinafter, the “Securitisation Regulation”), should it be resolved to voluntarily liquidate the relevant AIF, what would be the appropriate modality to continue to retain the relevant net economic interest? Would the retained net economic interest be distributed to AIF’s unit-holders, pro quota to their holdings, or would AIF’s liquidator be obliged to wait and complete the liquidation process only after the retention obligation has ceased to exist?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 2017/2402 (SecReg)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

Retention obligations

An alternative investment fund (“AIF”) managed by an alternative investment fund manager (“AIFM”) pursuant to Directive (EU) 61/2011, is set up to disburse loans to be subsequently securitised. According to Regulation (EU) 2402/2017 (hereinafter, the “Securitisation Regulation”), we believe that the AIFM and the AIF could fall within the definitions of, respectively, “originator” and “original lender”. According to Article 6(1) of the Securitisation Regulation the retention obligation can be fulfilled by either the originator, the original lender or the sponsor (if there is one) of a securitisation: in the above mentioned securitisation, can the retention obligation be therefore assumed alternatively by (i) the AIF as original lender, using the funds made available to it by investors or (ii) the AIFM as originator, using its own funds (i.e. not those of the AIF it manages)?

  • Legal act: Regulation (EU) No 2017/2402 (SecReg)
  • COM Delegated or Implementing Acts/RTS/ITS/GLs: Not applicable

EBA mapping tool deviation CR7-A column "Total exposures"

Following EBA ITS 2020/04, the instruction to fullfill CR7-A first column - Total exposures- recommands to disclosure :  "Exposure value (post conversion factors) in accordance with Articles 166 to 167 CRR Exposures shall be disclosed in accordance with the exposure class applicable to the obligor, without taking into account any substitution effects due to the existence of a guarantee."  => According to our understanding, we select EAD post conversion factor before credit risk mitigation (CRM) and not after CRM

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

Display of provision during substitution approaches

Due to the future application of the CRR3, the used of the IRB model will be limited. As example, some expositions (Corporates SME especially) considered with IRB method (and so displayed in C08A – CR IRBA form in COREP), are currently guaranteed by an institution or a sovereign which are also today considered with the IRB method. With CRR3, the debtor will probably stay with the IRB method (so still displayed in CR IRBA form in COREP), but there will be an outflow to the CR SA because the Basel method of the guarantor will be standard model. There will be an inflow in CR SA to display the metrics of the expositions after taking into account the characteristics of the guarantor (CRM). Around September 2021, we asked to your team, some precision about the “display of the provision during the substitution approach” under the reference 2021_6220. Our question result from the Q&A 2017_3335 which confirm the possibility to apply the substitution approach when the exposure and the guarantor are treated by the institution under different basel methods. Our Q&A has been rejected considering that the issue it deals with is already explained in section 3.1.1 of Annex II to Regulation (EU) No 2021/451 (ITS on Supervisory Reporting). Without mistake of our part and conversely of your affirmation, we are still considering the display of the provision non taking into account by the Q&A 2017_3335. For reminder, the display of the provision in COREP forms is different according to the Basel method applied: The value is displayed in column 0020 of C07 - CR SA uses the Basel method of the debtor Inversely for the C08 - CR IRB, the value is displayed in column 0290 (as memorandum item) uses the Basel method of the guarantor (if there is any)

  • 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