EBA report recommends environmental and social risk enhancements for financial sector

Bank Regulatory EU Of Interest to Non-US Persons ESG Capital Requirements Stress Test

On October 12, the European Banking Authority (EBA) announced the publication of a report on the role of environmental and social risks in the prudential framework of credit institutions and investment firms. The report recommends risk-based enhancements to the risk categories of the Pillar 1 framework, which sets capital requirements, noting that environmental and social risks are “changing the risk picture for the financial sector” and are expected to be more prominent over time. The report puts forward recommendations for actions over the next three years as part of the revised capital requirements regulations. Specifically, the EBA is proposing to: (i) include environmental risks as part of stress testing programs; (ii) encourage the inclusion of environmental and social factors as part of external credit assessments by credit rating agencies; (iii) encourage the inclusion of environmental and social factors as part of due diligence requirements and valuation of immovable property collateral; (iv) require institutions to identify whether environmental and social factors constitute triggers of operational risk losses; and (v) develop environment-related concentration risk metrics as part of supervisory reporting. With respect to revisions to the Pillar 1 framework, the report proposes: (i) the possible use of scenario analysis to enhance the forward-looking elements of the prudential framework; (ii) changes to the role that transition plans could play in the future; (iii) reassessing the appropriateness of revising the internal ratings-based supervisory formula and the corresponding standardized approach for credit risk to better reflect environmental risk elements; and (iv) the introduction of environment-related concentration risk metrics under the Pillar 1 framework.