InfoBytes Blog
Federal agencies announce measures to encourage consumer and business lending
On March 27, the Federal Reserve Board (Fed), the FDIC and the OCC jointly announced two measures the agencies have put in place to “support lending to households and businesses” during the Covid-19 pandemic. First, effective immediately, the agencies will “[a]llow[] early adoption of a new methodology on how certain banking organizations are required to measure counterparty credit risk derivatives contracts.” Second, the agencies will “[p]rovid[e] an optional extension of the regulatory capital transition for the new credit loss accounting standard.”
The first measure deals with the Standardized Approach for Calculating the Exposure Amount of Derivative Contracts (SA-CCR), which had an effective date of April 1. Allowing early adoption for the quarter ending on March 31 may “improve current market liquidity and smooth disruptions” caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Further, the interim final rule for Current Expected Credit Losses (CECL)—the second measure—was released to minimize the effect of the “CECL accounting standard [on] regulatory capital.” In addition to the transition period of three years already available, the interim final rule—Regulatory Capital Rule: Revised Transition of the Current Expected Credit Losses Methodology for Allowances—provides up to two more years to “mitigate the estimated cumulative regulatory capital effects” of CECL. Comments on the interim final rule must be submitted by May 11. (See OCC News Release 2020-42 here and FDIC press release here.)