Polish banks team up to create protection scheme (updated)

BNP Paribas Bank Polska SA

08/06/2022 09:48

(Adds detail, analyst comment)
    June 8 (Reuters) - The biggest commercial banks in Poland
have teamed up to create a protection scheme to help ensure
their liquidity and solvency, the banks said on Tuesday. 
    Alior Bank  ALRR.WA , BNP Paribas Bank Polska  BNP1.WA , ING
Bank Śląski  INGP.WA , mBank  MBK.WA , Bank Millennium
 MILP.WA , Bank Pekao  PEO.WA , PKO BP  PKO.WA  and Santander
Bank Polska  SPL1.WA  have all agreed to join.
    The scheme - which needs to be approved by Poland's KNF
financial regulator - will run in parallel to existing
institutional solutions, with banks obliged to make annual
payments to the Bank Guarantee Fund (BGF).
    Poland's biggest lender PKO BP estimated that its
contribution to the planned fund would be 872 million zlotys
($203.7 million), which will impact its results this year.
    However, mBank brokerage analyst Michal Konarski said the
initiative should be neutral or even slightly positive for
banks' results, pointing to the likelihood that the BGF will
lower the amount each bank will need to chip in to the deposit
guarantee scheme.
    "To sum up, these funds will balance themselves out and the
banks will not lose from it, you could even say that they will
benefit from it," Konarski told Reuters.
    The Polish banking index  .BNKI  was down about 1% in early
trade.
    Banks are expected to get a boost this year from rising
interest rates, but this could be offset by initiatives to help
mortgage payers.
    Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said in April that
as part of the plan to help borrowers, a new 3.5 billion zloty
aid fund would be created and funded from banks' profits. 
    The government has also proposed payment holidays for
borrowers, which could cost the sector nearly 30 billion zlotys
in 2022-23.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL5N2WN23X
    The banks plan to form a joint stock company which will
manage the protection scheme and funds they contribute to it.
    Each will put in "0.40% of the amount of the guaranteed
funds of the given bank covered by the mandatory deposit
guarantee scheme," they said.    
    ($1 = 4.2815 zlotys)

 (Reporting by Anna Pruchnicka; editing by Jason Neely and
Emelia Sithole-Matarise)
 ((anna.pruchnicka@thomsonreuters.com; +48 58 769 65 14;))