US regulators throw banks a curveball on committed credit lines
New Basel III charge on undrawn facilities will hit largest banks in areas like fund finance and credit cards
The US Basel III redraft of March 2026 has mainly drawn praise from banks for toning down capital impact, as compared with the July 2023 iteration.
But a breaking ball has caught the major US banks off balance: the addition of a capital requirement for credit facilities that can be unconditionally cancelled – a demand that could incur extra costs on a range of wholesale and retail lending.
“That was a surprise, because these are essentially not legally binding commitments,” says a capital expert
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