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Comprehensive Assessment Results

The European Central Bank (ECB) has published the results of the Comprehensive Assessment (CA) exercise undertaken on nine banks located in eight Member States participating in the Single Supervisory Mechanism (SSM) falling under, or likely to fall under, direct ECB supervision.

Similar to the exercise conducted in 2014, the latest Comprehensive Assessment consisted of two components, namely an Asset Quality Review (AQR) and a Stress Test (ST) on the basis of the methodologies devised by the ECB. One of the nine banks included in the Comprehensive Assessment involved a credit institution licensed by the Malta Financial Services Authority (MFSA), namely Medifin Holding Ltd, the holding company of Mediterranean Bank plc, and its subsidiaries Mediterranean Corporate Bank Ltd, and MeDirect Bank SA established in Belgium. Thus, on the basis of the criteria established by the ECB, Medifin Holding Ltd will be classified as a significant institution and directly supervised by the ECB from January 2016.

Medifin Holding Ltd started the exercise with a CET1 ratio of 10.72%. The AQR resulted in a downward adjustment of 87bps, so that the CET1 capital ratio following the AQR, at 9.85%, remained above the 8% minimum threshold.

Meanwhile, the impact of the Stress Test was estimated at 125bps under the more benign baseline scenario and 473bps under the adverse scenario. As a result of the Group registered profits during the period October 2014 to August 2015, Medifin Holding Ltd increased its CET 1 capital through a shareholder capital contribution of €28.7 million. Therefore, the results of the Stress Test show that under the adverse scenario, including the full impact of the AQR, Medifin's CET1 capital ratio at the end of September 2015 - the established cut-off date for the CA Disclosure Template - was above the 5.5% minimum threshold.

The Comprehensive Assessment results for Medifin Holding Ltd may be accessed through the website of the Central Bank of Malta and that of the Malta Financial Services Authority, respectively.

Further information on the Comprehensive Assessment and results for all the nine banks participating in this exercise is available on the website of the ECB.

ECB Comprehensive Assessment