Press release after the meeting of the Financial Stability Committee on macroprudential supervision

The meeting of the Financial Stability Committee on macroprudential supervision was held on 10 June 2022. The following persons participated in the meeting:

Paweł Szałamacha, Member of the Management Board of Narodowy Bank Polski as the Chair of the Committee,
Piotr Patkowski, Undersecretary of State, Ministry of Finance,
Jacek Jastrzębski, Chairman of the Polish Financial Supervision Authority,
Piotr Tomaszewski, President of the Management Board of the Bank Guarantee Fund.
Performing its statutory duties, the Committee passed a resolution on a recommendation addressed to the Minister of Finance on maintaining the countercyclical buffer rate at 0% in the second quarter of 2022. The representative of the Minister of Finance agreed with the recommendation and acknowledged that there is no need to take legislative action in this area.

Members of the Committee reviewed the Financial Stability Report prepared by NBP. The Report assesses that the banking sector remains highly resilient, even though several sources of risk are materialising simultaneously. However, the assessment is made against the background of high macroeconomic and geopolitical uncertainty resulting from the Russian Federation’s invasion of Ukraine. The Committee also notes the pressure related to expectations of support to borrowers, whose costs will be charged to banks. In principle, the Committee members shared the assessment of NBP, emphasising that the most important source of threat to the Polish financial system continues to be posed by the legal risk associated with the portfolio of FX housing loans, as well as vulnerabilities of some institutions, in terms of possible contagion effect.

The Committee highlighted the fact that due to a sharp rise in the cost of servicing housing loans, it is expected that in the coming months, interest in the Borrowers’ Support Fund will increase, and new contributions will be collected from lenders, which, combined with proposals of universal loan holidays will entail significant additional costs for the banking sector in the subsequent years. Furthermore, the Committee discussed issues related to the proposed changes to the WIBOR reference rate and decided to monitor the situation in this area if needed.

A summary of the currents trends in the domestic residential real estate market shows that prices in the housing market continue to rise steeply, particularly in the primary market, with a simultaneous marked decline in activity in the market for mortgage loans, which is largely the result of a gradual increase in interest rates and the changed regulatory requirements.

The Committee approved the Annual Report on Macroprudential Supervision Activity of the Financial Stability Committee 2021. The Report of the Committee is the fulfilment of the obligations stipulated in the Act on Macroprudential Supervision of the Financial System and Crisis Management and will be handed over to the Parliament of the Republic of Poland by the NBP Governor, the Chairman of the Committee, and will also be posted on the website.

In line with the Macroprudential Policy Strategy the Committee assessed progress in implementation of long-term development priorities. Among the actively performed priorities, the range of analytical instruments for systemic risk assessment was expanded significantly and the scope of the analysis of the calibration of macroprudential instruments was broadened.

Implementing the existing ESRB Recommendations, the Committee decided to inform the European Systemic Risk Board that no relevant third countries have been identified for the purposes of setting the countercyclical buffer rate and that Polish banks have no relevant exposures in Sweden, Norway and Belgium in connection with the application of the reciprocity mechanism of macroprudential instruments adopted in other countries.

The next regular meeting of the Committee on macroprudential supervision will take place in the third quarter of 2022.