By Neil MacLucas
ZURICH--The Swiss National Bank said Wednesday it has added the
Raiffeisen Group of cooperative banks to a list of financial
institutions that will come under more stringent supervision, the
latest move to limit risk in the Alpine country's financial
system.
The Zurich-based central bank said Raiffeisen Group, which is
active in the country's mortgage-lending market and is
Switzerland's third-largest banking group, will be required to
follow too-big-to-fail rules that already apply to some of the
country's largest banks. The rules require the banks to raise their
capital and liquidity bases, among other things.
The SNB said the decision was made in conjunction with the
Financial Market Supervisory Authority, or Finma, Switzerland's
financial industry regulator. UBS AG and Credit Suisse Group AG, as
well as Zuercher Kantonalbank, are already subject to the
more-stringent rules.
The move to more tightly regulate St. Gallen-based Raiffeisen,
which has more than 300 cooperatively structured banks and around
1,032 branches, comes as Swiss regulators and politicians seek to
rein in the country's biggest institutions in the wake of the 2008
bailout of UBS. In June, the SNB said "significant progress" has
been made by the country's largest banks in improving their capital
positions over the past year, although more needs to be done to
shore up their leverage ratios.
The banks' leverage ratios are becoming more important as
investors focus on the measure during times of stress, the SNB
said. Next year, international rules will require globally active
banks to disclose their leverage ratios, making direct comparisons
possible.
Separately on Wednesday, Raiffeisen Group reported a 2.8% rise
in assets under management to 192.3 billion Swiss francs ($211.8
billion) for the six months through June 30 and said mortgage
lending rose 2.4% to 147.2 billion francs.
Write to Neil MacLucas at neil.maclucas@wsj.com