FRANKFURT: The European Central Bank (ECB) will change a non-disclosure agreement with banks undergoing its stress tests after complaints from German banks that they risked getting into conflict with laws requiring them to disclose price-sensitive information.
German banks have refused to sign a confidentiality agreement which requires them to remain silent about meetings planned for September, at which the regulator will offer general guidance about the results of the tests which will be published in late October.
In a letter to the ECB's top regulators, the German Banking Industry Committee - an umbrella association representing the likes of Deutsche Bank, Commerzbank and thousands of unlisted cooperative and savings banks - warned of "significant risks" and said the ECB's demands to keep mum about the so-called supervisory dialogue put banks in conflict with laws requiring disclosure of price-sensitive information.
The ECB told Reuters it was planning to alter the confidentiality pact.
"We're working closely with banks and as part of this, we will address feedback received on the non-disclosure agreement in a revised version to issue to banks in the coming days," a spokesman for the ECB said.
The ECB is putting some 130 of the euro zone's largest banks through checks of their ability to withstand future crises before it becomes their supervisor in November.
The German Banking Industry Committee said the ECB's plans did not allow them enough time to analyse and verify the test results once they are revealed as planned in the second half of October. It called on the ECB for more time and transparency to deal with the results.
Separately, the committee also criticized ECB plans to guard against data leaks by giving banks just 48 hours to review the full results of the balance sheet checks before the ECB makes them public.
"This lead time is by no means sufficient for a review of the respective data," the committee said in a letter to Daniele Nouy, head of the ECB's supervisory board, and Executive Board member Sabine Lautenschlaeger.
The committee's complaint comes shortly after Germany's savings bank association accused the ECB of acting arbitrarily and inconsistently, saying its procedures seemed designed to disadvantage the strongest institutions.
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