3.1.2. The ‘Internal Assessment Approach’ for positions in ABCP programmes

Subject to the approval of the competent authorities, when the following conditions are satisfied a credit institution may attribute to an unrated position in an ABCP programme a derived rating as laid down in point 44: positions in the commercial paper issued from the ABCP programme shall be rated positions; the credit institution shall satisfy the competent authorities that its internal assessment of the credit quality of the position reflects the publicly available assessment methodology of one or more eligible ECAIs, for the rating of securities backed by the exposures of the type securitised; the ECAIs, the methodology of which shall be reflected as required by the point (b), shall include those ECAIs which have provided an external rating for the commercial paper issued from the ABCP programme. Quantitative elements, such as stress factors, used in assessing the position to a particular credit quality must be at least as conservative as those used in the relevant assessment methodology of the ECAIs in question; in developing its internal assessment methodology the credit institution shall take into consideration relevant published ratings methodologies of the eligible ECAIs that rate the commercial paper of the ABCP programme. This consideration shall be documented by the credit institution and updated regularly, as outlined in point (g); the credit institution's internal assessment methodology shall include rating grades. There shall be a correspondence between such rating grades and the credit assessments of eligible ECAIs. This correspondence shall be explicitly documented; the internal assessment methodology shall be used in the credit institution's internal risk management processes, including its decision making, management information and capital allocation processes; internal or external auditors, an ECAI, or the credit institution's internal credit review or risk management function shall perform regular reviews of the internal assessment process and the quality of the internal assessments of the credit quality of the credit institution's exposures to an ABCP programme. If the credit institution's internal audit, credit review, or risk management functions perform the review, then these functions shall be independent of the ABCP programme business line, as well as the customer relationship; the credit institution shall track the performance of its internal ratings over time to evaluate the performance of its internal assessment methodology and shall make adjustments, as necessary, to that methodology when the performance of the exposures routinely diverges from that indicated by the internal ratings; the ABCP programme shall incorporate underwriting standards in the form of credit and investment guidelines. In deciding on an asset purchase, the ABCP programme administrator shall consider the type of asset being purchased, the type and monetary value of the exposures arising from the provision of liquidity facilities and credit enhancements, the loss distribution, and the legal and economic isolation of the transferred assets from the entity selling the assets. A credit analysis of the asset seller's risk profile shall be performed and shall include analysis of past and expected future financial performance, current market position, expected future competitiveness, leverage, cash flow, interest coverage and debt rating. In addition, a review of the seller's underwriting standards, servicing capabilities, and collection processes shall be performed; the ABCP programme's underwriting standards shall establish minimum asset eligibility criteria that, in particular: exclude the purchase of assets that are significantly past due or defaulted; limit excess concentration to individual obligor or geographic area; and limits the tenor of the assets to be purchased; the ABCP programme shall have collections policies and processes that take into account the operational capability and credit quality of the servicer. The ABCP programme shall mitigate seller/servicer risk through various methods, such as triggers based on current credit quality that would preclude commingling of funds; the aggregated estimate of loss on an asset pool that the ABCP programme is considering purchasing must take into account all sources of potential risk, such as credit and dilution risk. If the seller-provided credit enhancement is sized based only on credit-related losses, then a separate reserve shall be established for dilution risk, if dilution risk is material for the particular exposure pool. In addition, in sizing the required enhancement level, the program shall review several years of historical information, including losses, delinquencies, dilutions, and the turnover rate of the receivables; and the ABCP programme shall incorporate structural features — for example wind down triggers — into the purchase of exposures in order to mitigate potential credit deterioration of the underlying portfolio. The requirement for the assessment methodology of the ECAI to be publicly available may be waived by the competent authorities where they are satisfied that due to the specific features of the securitisation — for example its unique structure — there is as yet no publicly available ECAI assessment methodology. The unrated position shall be assigned by the credit institution to one of the rating grades described in point 43. The position shall be attributed a derived rating the same as the credit assessments corresponding to that rating grade as laid down in point 43. Where this derived rating is, at the inception of the securitisation, at the level of investment grade or better, it shall be considered the same as an eligible credit assessment by an eligible ECAI for the purposes of calculating risk-weighted exposure amounts.

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Source: EUR-Lex (Cellar) · retrieved 2026-10-09 · Text as adopted (Official Journal); later amendments are not incorporated in this text.