V. Operational Risk
A. Definition of operational risk

644. Operational risk is defined as the risk of loss resulting from inadequate or failed internal processes, people and systems or from external events.

This definition includes legal risk*, but excludes strategic and reputational risk.

* Legal risk includes, but is not limited to, exposure to fines, penalties, or punitive damages resulting from supervisory actions, as well as private settlements.

B. The measurement methodologies

645. The framework outlined below presents three methods for calculating operational risk capital charges in a continuum of increasing sophistication and risk sensitivity:

(i) the Basic Indicator Approach;

(ii) the Standardised Approach; and

(iii) Advanced Measurement Approaches (AMA).

646. Banks are encouraged to move along the spectrum of available approaches as they develop more sophisticated operational risk measurement systems and practices.

Qualifying criteria for the Standardised Approach and AMA are presented below.

647. Internationally active banks and banks with significant operational risk exposures (for example, specialised processing banks) are expected to use an approach that is more sophisticated than the Basic Indicator Approach and that is appropriate for the risk profile of the institution*.

A bank will be permitted to use the Basic Indicator or Standardised Approach for some parts of its operations and an AMA for others provided certain minimum criteria are met, see paragraphs 680 to 683.

* Supervisors will review the capital requirement produced by the operational risk approach used by a bank (whether Basic Indicator Approach, Standardised Approach or AMA) for general credibility, especially in relation to a firm’s peers. In the event that credibility is lacking, appropriate supervisory action under Pillar 2 will be considered.

648. A bank will not be allowed to choose to revert to a simpler approach once it has been approved for a more advanced approach without supervisory approval.

However, if a supervisor determines that a bank using a more advanced approach no longer meets the qualifying criteria for this approach, it may require the bank to revert to a simpler approach for some or all of its operations, until it meets the conditions specified by the supervisor for returning to a more advanced approach.

1. The Basic Indicator Approach

649. Banks using the Basic Indicator Approach must hold capital for operational risk equal to the average over the previous three years of a fixed percentage (denoted alpha) of positive annual gross income. Figures for any year in which annual gross income is negative or zero should be excluded from both the numerator and denominator when calculating the average.

The charge* may be expressed as follows:

* If negative gross income distorts a bank’s Pillar 1 capital charge, supervisors will consider appropriate supervisory action under Pillar 2.

where:

KBIA = the capital charge under the Basic Indicator Approach

GI = annual gross income, where positive, over the previous three years

N = number of the previous three years for which gross income is positive

α = 15%, which is set by the Committee, relating the industry wide level of required capital to the industry wide level of the indicator.

650. Gross income is defined as net interest income plus net non-interest income*.

100 It is intended that this measure should:

(i) be gross of any provisions (e.g. for unpaid interest);

(ii) be gross of operating expenses, including fees paid to outsourcing service providers;**

(iii) exclude realised profits/losses from the sale of securities in the banking book;*** and

(iv) exclude extraordinary or irregular items as well as income derived from insurance.

* As defined by national supervisors and/or national accounting standards.

** In contrast to fees paid for services that are outsourced, fees received by banks that provide outsourcing services shall be included in the definition of gross income.

*** Realised profits/losses from securities classified as “held to maturity” and “available for sale”, which typically constitute items of the banking book (e.g. under certain accounting standards), are also excluded from the definition of gross income.

651. As a point of entry for capital calculation, no specific criteria for use of the Basic Indicator Approach are set out in this Framework.

Nevertheless, banks using this approach are encouraged to comply with the Committee’s guidance on Sound Practices for the Management and Supervision of Operational Risk, February 2003.

2. The Standardised Approach

652. In the Standardised Approach, banks’ activities are divided into eight business lines:
corporate

• finance

• trading & sales

• retail banking

• commercial banking

• payment & settlement

• agency services

• asset management

• retail brokerage

The business lines are defined in detail in Annex 8.

* The Committee intends to reconsider the calibration of the Basic Indicator and Standardised Approaches when more risk-sensitive data are available to carry out this recalibration.

Any such recalibration would not be intended to affect significantly the overall calibration of the operational risk component of the Pillar 1 capital charge.

The Alternative Standardised Approach: At national supervisory discretion a supervisor can choose to allow a bank to use the Alternative Standardised Approach (ASA) provided the bank is able to satisfy its supervisor that this alternative approach provides an improved basis by, for example, avoiding double counting of risks.

Once a bank has been allowed to use the ASA, it will not be allowed to revert to use of the Standardised Approach without the permission of its supervisor.

It is not envisaged that large diversified banks in major markets would use the ASA.

Under the ASA, the operational risk capital charge/methodology is the same as for the Standardised Approach except for two business lines — retail banking and commercial banking.

For these business lines, loans and advances — multiplied by a fixed factor ‘m’ — replaces gross income as the exposure indicator.

The betas for retail and commercial banking are unchanged from the Standardised Approach.

The ASA operational risk capital charge for retail banking (with the same basic formula for commercial banking) can be expressed as:

K_RB = β_RB x m x LA_RB

where

K_RB is the capital charge for the retail banking business line

β_RB is the beta for the retail banking business line

LA_RB is total outstanding retail loans and advances (non-risk weighted and gross of provisions), averaged over the past three years

m is 0.035

For the purposes of the ASA, total loans and advances in the retail banking business line consists of the total drawn amounts in the following credit portfolios: retail, SMEs treated as retail, and purchased retail receivables.

For commercial banking, total loans and advances consists of the drawn amounts in the following credit portfolios: corporate, sovereign, bank, specialised lending, SMEs treated as corporate and purchased corporate receivables.

The book value of securities held in the banking book should also be included.

Under the ASA, banks may aggregate retail and commercial banking (if they wish to) using a beta of 15%.

Similarly, those banks that are unable to disaggregate their gross income into the other six business lines can aggregate the total gross income for these six business lines using a beta of 18%, with negative gross income treated as described in paragraph 654.

As under the Standardised Approach, the total capital charge for the ASA is calculated as the simple summation of the regulatory capital charges across each of the eight business lines.

653. Within each business line, gross income is a broad indicator that serves as a proxy for the scale of business operations and thus the likely scale of operational risk exposure within each of these business lines.

The capital charge for each business line is calculated by multiplying gross income by a factor (denoted beta) assigned to that business line.

Beta serves as a proxy for the industry-wide relationship between the operational risk loss experience for a given business line and the aggregate level of gross income for that business line.

It should be noted that in the Standardised Approach gross income is measured for each business line, not the whole institution, i.e. in corporate finance, the indicator is the gross income generated in the corporate finance business line.

654. The total capital charge is calculated as the three-year average of the simple summation of the regulatory capital charges across each of the business lines in each year.

In any given year, negative capital charges (resulting from negative gross income) in any business line may offset positive capital charges in other business lines without limit.*

However, where the aggregate capital charge across all business lines within a given year is negative, then the input to the numerator for that year will be zero**.

The total capital charge may be expressed as:

*  At national discretion, supervisors may adopt a more conservative treatment of negative gross income.

** As under the Basic Indicator Approach, if negative gross income distorts a bank’s Pillar 1 capital charge under the Standardised Approach, supervisors will consider appropriate supervisory action under Pillar 2.

3. Advanced Measurement Approaches (AMA)

655. Under the AMA, the regulatory capital requirement will equal the risk measure generated by the bank’s internal operational risk measurement system using the quantitative and qualitative criteria for the AMA discussed below.

Use of the AMA is subject to supervisory approval.

656. A bank adopting the AMA may, with the approval of its host supervisors and the support of its home supervisor, use an allocation mechanism for the purpose of determining the regulatory capital requirement for internationally active banking subsidiaries that are not deemed to be significant relative to the overall banking group but are themselves subject to this Framework in accordance with Part 1.

Supervisory approval would be conditional on the bank demonstrating to the satisfaction of the relevant supervisors that the allocation mechanism for these subsidiaries is appropriate and can be supported empirically.

The board of directors and senior management of each subsidiary are responsible for conducting their own assessment of the subsidiary’s operational risks and controls and ensuring the subsidiary is adequately capitalised in respect of those risks.

657. Subject to supervisory approval as discussed in paragraph 669(d), the incorporation of a well-reasoned estimate of diversification benefits may be factored in at the group-wide level or at the banking subsidiary level.

However, any banking subsidiaries whose host supervisors determine that they must calculate stand-alone capital requirements (see Part 1) may not incorporate group-wide diversification benefits in their AMA calculations (e.g. where an internationally active banking subsidiary is deemed to be significant, the banking
subsidiary may incorporate the diversification benefits of its own operations — those arising at the sub-consolidated level — but may not incorporate the diversification benefits of the parent).

658. The appropriateness of the allocation methodology will be reviewed with consideration given to the stage of development of risk-sensitive allocation techniques and the extent to which it reflects the level of operational risk in the legal entities and across the banking group.

Supervisors expect that AMA banking groups will continue efforts to develop increasingly risk-sensitive operational risk allocation techniques, notwithstanding initial approval of techniques based on gross income or other proxies for operational risk.

659. Banks adopting the AMA will be required to calculate their capital requirement using this approach as well as the 1988 Accord as outlined in paragraph 46.

C. Qualifying criteria
1. The Standardised Approach*

* Supervisors allowing banks to use the Alternative Standardised Approach must decide on the appropriate qualifying criteria for that approach, as the criteria set forth in paragraphs 662 and 663 of this section may not be appropriate

660. In order to qualify for use of the Standardised Approach, a bank must satisfy its supervisor that, at a minimum:

• Its board of directors and senior management, as appropriate, are actively involved in the oversight of the operational risk management framework;

• It has an operational risk management system that is conceptually sound and is implemented with integrity; and

• It has sufficient resources in the use of the approach in the major business lines as well as the control and audit areas.

661. Supervisors will have the right to insist on a period of initial monitoring of a bank’s Standardised Approach before it is used for regulatory capital purposes.

662. A bank must develop specific policies and have documented criteria for mapping gross income for current business lines and activities into the standardised framework.

The criteria must be reviewed and adjusted for new or changing business activities as appropriate.

The principles for business line mapping are set out in Annex 8.

663. As some internationally active banks will wish to use the Standardised Approach, it is important that such banks have adequate operational risk management systems.

Consequently, an internationally active bank using the Standardised Approach must meet the following additional criteria:*

(a) The bank must have an operational risk management system with clear responsibilities assigned to an operational risk management function.

The operational risk management function is responsible for developing strategies to identify, assess, monitor and control/mitigate operational risk;

• for codifying firm-level policies and procedures concerning operational risk management and controls;

• for the design and implementation of the firm’s operational risk assessment methodology;

• for the design and implementation of a risk-reporting system for operational risk.

(b) As part of the bank’s internal operational risk assessment system, the bank must systematically track relevant operational risk data including material losses by business line.

Its operational risk assessment system must be closely integrated into the risk management processes of the bank.

Its output must be an integral part of the process of monitoring and controlling the banks operational risk profile.

For instance, this information must play a prominent role in risk reporting, management reporting, and risk analysis.

The bank must have techniques for creating incentives to improve the management of operational risk throughout the firm.

(c) There must be regular reporting of operational risk exposures, including material operational losses, to business unit management, senior management, and to the board of directors.

The bank must have procedures for taking appropriate action according to the information within the management reports.

(d) The bank’s operational risk management system must be well documented.

The bank must have a routine in place for ensuring compliance with a documented set of internal policies, controls and procedures concerning the operational risk management system, which must include policies for the treatment of non compliance issues.

(e) The bank’s operational risk management processes and assessment system must be subject to validation and regular independent review.

These reviews must include both the activities of the business units and of the operational risk management
function.

(f) The bank’s operational risk assessment system (including the internal validation processes) must be subject to regular review by external auditors and/or supervisors.

* For other banks, these criteria are recommended, with national discretion to impose them as requirements.

2. Advanced Measurement Approaches (AMA)
(i) General standards

664. In order to qualify for use of the AMA a bank must satisfy its supervisor that, at a minimum:

• Its board of directors and senior management, as appropriate, are actively involved in the oversight of the operational risk management framework;

• It has an operational risk management system that is conceptually sound and is implemented with integrity; and

• It has sufficient resources in the use of the approach in the major business lines as well as the control and audit areas.

665. A bank’s AMA will be subject to a period of initial monitoring by its supervisor before it can be used for regulatory purposes.

This period will allow the supervisor to determine whether the approach is credible and appropriate.

As discussed below, a bank’s internal measurement system must reasonably estimate unexpected losses based on the combined use of internal and relevant external loss data, scenario analysis and bank-specific business
environment and internal control factors.

The bank’s measurement system must also be capable of supporting an allocation of economic capital for operational risk across business lines in a manner that creates incentives to improve business line operational risk management.

(ii) Qualitative standards

666. A bank must meet the following qualitative standards before it is permitted to use an AMA for operational risk capital:

(a) The bank must have an independent operational risk management function that is responsible for the design and implementation of the bank’s operational risk management framework. 

The operational risk management function is responsible for codifying firm-level policies and procedures concerning operational risk management and controls;

• for the design and implementation of the firm’s operational risk measurement methodology;

• for the design and implementation of a risk-reporting system for operational risk;

• and for developing strategies to identify, measure, monitor and control/mitigate operational risk

(b) The bank’s internal operational risk measurement system must be closely integrated into the day-to-day risk management processes of the bank.

Its output must be an integral part of the process of monitoring and controlling the bank’s operational risk
profile.

For instance, this information must play a prominent role in risk reporting, management reporting, internal capital allocation, and risk analysis.

The bank must have techniques for allocating operational risk capital to major business lines and for
creating incentives to improve the management of operational risk throughout the firm.

(c) There must be regular reporting of operational risk exposures and loss experience to business unit management, senior management, and to the board of directors.

The bank must have procedures for taking appropriate action according to the information within the management reports.

(d) The bank’s operational risk management system must be well documented.

The bank must have a routine in place for ensuring compliance with a documented set of internal policies, controls and procedures concerning the operational risk management system, which must include policies for the treatment of non compliance issues.

(e) Internal and/or external auditors must perform regular reviews of the operational risk management processes and measurement systems.

This review must include both the activities of the business units and of the independent operational risk
management function.

(f) The validation of the operational risk measurement system by external auditors and/or supervisory authorities must include the following:

• Verifying that the internal validation processes are operating in a satisfactory manner; and

• Making sure that data flows and processes associated with the risk measurement system are transparent and accessible.

In particular, it is necessary that auditors and supervisory authorities are in a position to have easy access, whenever they
judge it necessary and under appropriate procedures, to the system’s specifications and parameters.

(iii) Quantitative standards
AMA soundness standard

667. Given the continuing evolution of analytical approaches for operational risk, the Committee is not specifying the approach or distributional assumptions used to generate the operational risk measure for regulatory capital purposes.

However, a bank must be able to demonstrate that its approach captures potentially severe ‘tail’ loss events.

Whatever approach is used, a bank must demonstrate that its operational risk measure meets a soundness standard comparable to that of the internal ratings-based approach for credit risk, (i.e. comparable to a one year holding period and a 99.9th percentile confidence interval).

668. The Committee recognises that the AMA soundness standard provides significant flexibility to banks in the development of an operational risk measurement and management system.

However, in the development of these systems, banks must have and maintain rigorous procedures for operational risk model development and independent model validation.

Prior to implementation, the Committee will review evolving industry practices regarding credible and consistent estimates of potential operational losses.

It will also review accumulated data, and the level of capital requirements estimated by the AMA, and may
refine its proposals if appropriate.

Detailed criteria

669. This section describes a series of quantitative standards that will apply to internally generated operational risk measures for purposes of calculating the regulatory minimum capital charge.

(a) Any internal operational risk measurement system must be consistent with the scope of operational risk defined by the Committee in paragraph 644 and the loss event types defined in Annex 9.

(b) Supervisors will require the bank to calculate its regulatory capital requirement as the sum of expected loss (EL) and unexpected loss (UL), unless the bank can demonstrate that it is adequately capturing EL in its internal business practices.

That is, to base the minimum regulatory capital requirement on UL alone, the bank must be able to demonstrate to the satisfaction of its national supervisor that it has measured and accounted for its EL exposure.

(c) A bank’s risk measurement system must be sufficiently ‘granular’ to capture the major drivers of operational risk affecting the shape of the tail of the loss estimates.

(d) Risk measures for different operational risk estimates must be added for purposes of calculating the regulatory minimum capital requirement.

However, the bank may be permitted to use internally determined correlations in operational risk losses
across individual operational risk estimates, provided it can demonstrate to the satisfaction of the national supervisor that its systems for determining correlations are sound, implemented with integrity, and take into account the uncertainty surrounding any such correlation estimates (particularly in periods of stress).

The bank must validate its correlation assumptions using appropriate quantitative and qualitative techniques.

(e) Any operational risk measurement system must have certain key features to meet the supervisory soundness standard set out in this section.

These elements must include the use of internal data, relevant external data, scenario analysis and factors
reflecting the business environment and internal control systems.

(f) A bank needs to have a credible, transparent, well-documented and verifiable approach for weighting these fundamental elements in its overall operational risk measurement system.

For example, there may be cases where estimates of the 99.9th percentile confidence interval based primarily on internal and external loss event data would be unreliable for business lines with a heavy-tailed loss distribution
and a small number of observed losses.

In such cases, scenario analysis, and business environment and control factors, may play a more dominant role in the risk measurement system.

Conversely, operational loss event data may play a more dominant role in the risk measurement system for business lines where estimates of the 99.9th percentile confidence interval based primarily on such data are deemed reliable.

In all cases, the bank’s approach for weighting the four fundamental elements should be internally consistent and avoid the double counting of qualitative assessments or risk mitigants already recognised in other elements of the framework.

Internal data

670. Banks must track internal loss data according to the criteria set out in this section.

The tracking of internal loss event data is an essential prerequisite to the development and functioning of a credible operational risk measurement system.

Internal loss data is crucial for tying a bank’s risk estimates to its actual loss experience.

This can be achieved in a number of ways, including using internal loss data as the foundation of empirical risk
estimates, as a means of validating the inputs and outputs of the bank’s risk measurement system, or as the link between loss experience and risk management and control decisions.

671. Internal loss data is most relevant when it is clearly linked to a bank’s current business activities, technological processes and risk management procedures.

Therefore, a bank must have documented procedures for assessing the on-going relevance of historical
loss data, including those situations in which judgement overrides, scaling, or other adjustments may be used, to what extent they may be used and who is authorised to make such decisions.

672. Internally generated operational risk measures used for regulatory capital purposes must be based on a minimum five-year observation period of internal loss data, whether the internal loss data is used directly to build the loss measure or to validate it.

When the bank first moves to the AMA, a three-year historical data window is acceptable (this includes the
parallel calculations in paragraph 46).

673. To qualify for regulatory capital purposes, a bank’s internal loss collection processes must meet the following standards:

• To assist in supervisory validation, a bank must be able to map its historical internal loss data into the relevant level 1 supervisory categories defined in Annexes 8 and 9 and to provide these data to supervisors upon request.

It must have documented, objective criteria for allocating losses to the specified business lines and event
types.

However, it is left to the bank to decide the extent to which it applies these categorisations in its internal operational risk measurement system.

• A bank’s internal loss data must be comprehensive in that it captures all material activities and exposures from all appropriate sub-systems and geographic locations.

A bank must be able to justify that any excluded activities or exposures, both individually and in combination, would not have a material impact on the overall risk estimates.

A bank must have an appropriate de minimis gross loss threshold for internal loss data collection, for example €10,000.

The appropriate threshold may vary somewhat between banks, and within a bank across business lines and/or
event types.

However, particular thresholds should be broadly consistent with those used by peer banks.

• Aside from information on gross loss amounts, a bank should collect information about the date of the event, any recoveries of gross loss amounts, as well as some descriptive information about the drivers or causes of the loss event.

The level of detail of any descriptive information should be commensurate with the size of the gross loss amount.

• A bank must develop specific criteria for assigning loss data arising from an event in a centralised function (e.g. an information technology department) or an activity that spans more than one business line, as well as from related events over time.

• Operational risk losses that are related to credit risk and have historically been included in banks’ credit risk databases (e.g. collateral management failures) will continue to be treated as credit risk for the purposes of calculating minimum regulatory capital under this Framework.

Therefore, such losses will not be subject to the operational risk capital charge*.

Nevertheless, for the purposes of internal operational risk management, banks must identify all material operational risk losses consistent with the scope of the definition of operational risk (as set out in paragraph
644 and the loss event types outlined in Annex 9), including those related to credit risk.

Such material operational risk-related credit risk losses should be flagged separately within a bank’s internal operational risk database.

The materiality of these losses may vary between banks, and within a bank across business lines and/or event types. Materiality thresholds should be broadly consistent with those used by peer banks.

• Operational risk losses that are related to market risk are treated as operational risk for the purposes of calculating minimum regulatory capital under this Framework and will therefore be subject to the operational risk capital charge.

* This applies to all banks, including those that may only now be designing their credit risk and operational risk databases.

External data

674. A bank’s operational risk measurement system must use relevant external data (either public data and/or pooled industry data), especially when there is reason to believe that the bank is exposed to infrequent, yet potentially severe, losses.

These external data should include data on actual loss amounts, information on the scale of business operations
where the event occurred, information on the causes and circumstances of the loss events, or other information that would help in assessing the relevance of the loss event for other banks.

A bank must have a systematic process for determining the situations for which external data must be used and the methodologies used to incorporate the data (e.g. scaling, qualitative adjustments, or informing the development of improved scenario analysis).

The conditions and practices for external data use must be regularly reviewed, documented, and subject to periodic independent review.

Scenario analysis

675. A bank must use scenario analysis of expert opinion in conjunction with external data to evaluate its exposure to high-severity events.

This approach draws on the knowledge of experienced business managers and risk management experts to derive reasoned assessments of plausible severe losses.

For instance, these expert assessments could be expressed as parameters of an assumed statistical loss distribution.

In addition, scenario analysis should be used to assess the impact of deviations from the correlation assumptions embedded in the bank’s operational risk measurement framework, in particular, to evaluate
potential losses arising from multiple simultaneous operational risk loss events.

Over time, such assessments need to be validated and re-assessed through comparison to actual loss
experience to ensure their reasonableness.

Business environment and internal control factors

676. In addition to using loss data, whether actual or scenario-based, a bank’s firm-wide risk assessment methodology must capture key business environment and internal control factors that can change its operational risk profile.

These factors will make a bank’s risk assessments more forward-looking, more directly reflect the quality of the bank’s control and operating environments, help align capital assessments with risk management objectives,
and recognise both improvements and deterioration in operational risk profiles in a more immediate fashion.

To qualify for regulatory capital purposes, the use of these factors in a bank’s risk measurement framework must meet the following standards:

• The choice of each factor needs to be justified as a meaningful driver of risk, based on experience and involving the expert judgment of the affected business areas.

Whenever possible, the factors should be translatable into quantitative measures that lend themselves to verification.

• The sensitivity of a bank’s risk estimates to changes in the factors and the relative weighting of the various factors need to be well reasoned.

In addition to capturing changes in risk due to improvements in risk controls, the framework must also
capture potential increases in risk due to greater complexity of activities or increased business volume.

• The framework and each instance of its application, including the supporting rationale for any adjustments to empirical estimates, must be documented and subject to independent review within the bank and by supervisors.

• Over time, the process and the outcomes need to be validated through comparison to actual internal loss experience, relevant external data, and appropriate adjustments made.

(iv) Risk mitigation*

*  The Committee intends to continue an ongoing dialogue with the industry on the use of risk mitigants for operational risk and, in due course, may consider revising the criteria for and limits on the recognition of operational risk mitigants on the basis of growing experience.

677. Under the AMA, a bank will be allowed to recognise the risk mitigating impact of insurance in the measures of operational risk used for regulatory minimum capital requirements.

The recognition of insurance mitigation will be limited to 20% of the total operational risk capital charge calculated under the AMA.

678. A bank’s ability to take advantage of such risk mitigation will depend on compliance with the following criteria:

• The insurance provider has a minimum claims paying ability rating of A (or equivalent).

• The insurance policy must have an initial term of no less than one year.

For policies with a residual term of less than one year, the bank must make appropriate haircuts reflecting the declining residual term of the policy, up to a full 100% haircut for policies with a residual term of 90 days or less.

• The insurance policy has a minimum notice period for cancellation of 90 days.

• The insurance policy has no exclusions or limitations triggered by supervisory actions or, in the case of a failed bank, that preclude the bank, receiver or liquidator from recovering for damages suffered or expenses incurred by the bank, except in respect of events occurring after the initiation of receivership or liquidation proceedings in respect of the bank, provided that the insurance policy may exclude any fine, penalty, or punitive damages resulting from supervisory actions.

• The risk mitigation calculations must reflect the bank’s insurance coverage in a manner that is transparent in its relationship to, and consistent with, the actual likelihood and impact of loss used in the bank’s overall determination of its operational risk capital.

• The insurance is provided by a third-party entity. In the case of insurance through captives and affiliates, the exposure has to be laid off to an independent third-party entity, for example through re-insurance, that meets the eligibility criteria.

• The framework for recognising insurance is well reasoned and documented.

• The bank discloses a description of its use of insurance for the purpose of mitigating operational risk.

679. A bank’s methodology for recognising insurance under the AMA also needs to capture the following elements through appropriate discounts or haircuts in the amount of insurance recognition:

• The residual term of a policy, where less than one year, as noted above;

• A policy’s cancellation terms, where less than one year; and

• The uncertainty of payment as well as mismatches in coverage of insurance policies.

D. Partial use

680. A bank will be permitted to use an AMA for some parts of its operations and the Basic Indicator Approach or Standardised Approach for the balance (partial use), provided that the following conditions are met:

• All operational risks of the bank’s global, consolidated operations are captured;

• All of the bank’s operations that are covered by the AMA meet the qualitative criteria for using an AMA, while those parts of its operations that are using one of the simpler approaches meet the qualifying criteria for that approach;

• On the date of implementation of an AMA, a significant part of the bank’s operational risks are captured by the AMA; and

• The bank provides its supervisor with a plan specifying the timetable to which it intends to roll out the AMA across all but an immaterial part of its operations.

The plan should be driven by the practicality and feasibility of moving to the AMA over time, and not for other reasons.

681. Subject to the approval of its supervisor, a bank opting for partial use may determine which parts of its operations will use an AMA on the basis of business line, legal structure, geography, or other internally determined basis.

682. Subject to the approval of its supervisor, where a bank intends to implement an approach other than the AMA on a global, consolidated basis and it does not meet the third and/or fourth conditions in paragraph 680, the bank may, in limited circumstances:

• Implement an AMA on a permanent partial basis; and

• Include in its global, consolidated operational risk capital requirements the results of an AMA calculation at a subsidiary where the AMA has been approved by the relevant host supervisor and is acceptable to the bank’s home supervisor.

683. Approvals of the nature described in paragraph 682 should be granted only on an exceptional basis. Such exceptional approvals should generally be limited to circumstances where a bank is prevented from meeting these conditions due to implementation decisions of supervisors of the bank’s subsidiary operations in foreign jurisdictions.

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