The EBA Lobbies For The Creation Of A European Bad Bank

31 January 2017 – El Economista

On Monday, the European Banking Authority (EBA) urged the European Union (EU) authorities to establish an alternative investment fund to acquire delinquent loans from the European financial sector, with the aim of stimulating economic growth in the region.

In a speech in Luxembourg, the President of the EBA, Andrea Ernie, highlighted that tackling the high level of delinquent debt in the EU – which stands at approximately €1 billion – is an “urgent and viable” issue, according to Reuters.

In this sense, Enria indicated that EU banks may sell some of their non-performing loans to an EU “asset management” company.

Enria proposes assigning an agreed “real economic value” to the non-performing loans sold and for the investment fund that buys them to act as a “bad bank”, given that it would have the obligation to dispose of the assets within three years at their real economic value, rather than at market price.

“If that value is not achieved, the bank must bear the impact at the market price and a public recapitalization must be carried out with all the conditions that accompany the process”, said the President of the EBA.

In this regard, the Managing Director of the European Stability Mechanism (MEDE), Klaus Regling, welcomed the EBA’s initiative and added that the proposal does not involve sharing banking risks between member states, which is something that Germany has firmly opposed in recent years.

“It is likely that the public sector will have to play a role”, said Regling at the event, where he also said that the “bad bank” should aim to acquire up to €250,000 million of non-performing loans.

Original story: El Economista

Translation: Carmel Drake