GCC banks accommodate smoothly to Basel III

Governor of the Central Bank of Kuwait (CBK) Dr. Mohammad Youssof Al-Hashel said Wednesday the GCC banks face no problem in implementing the Third Basel Accord (Basel III) - a global, voluntary regulatory standard on bank capital adequacy, stress testing and market liquidity risk. Thanks to their strong financial positions and high solvency rates, the GCC banks, particularly the Kuwaiti ones, will be able to implement the reforms envisaged in Basel III before the set deadline, he said. Dr. Al-Hashel made the press remarks on the sidelines of the 59th meeting of the Committee of Governors of Monetary Agencies and Central Banks in Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries here. "Today's meeting reviewed the experiment of each country regarding the implementation of the accord and assessed how far they adapted to the global standards," he pointed out. "Kuwait made headway in the experimental application of the accord last year and started as of the beginning of 2014 the actual implementation," Dr. Al-Hashel revealed. Kuwait targets the implementation of 12.5 percent of the accord this year while the required percentage by 2016 is 13 percent, he noted. The local banks met the four stages of the reforms envisages in Basel III, he said, noting that the CBK adopted a gradual approach to the implementation process. Dr. Al-Hashel added that many of the local banks have sufficient capital for meeting the accord's requirements while some others need to increase their capital. "The governors of the GCC banks also discussed during today's meeting the guidelines for meeting the global standards relating to the auditing and supervision and agreed to do more efforts in this regard," he went on. "They spoke highly of Kuwait for hosting the training program for the GCC auditor, to be hold late this year in collaboration with the International Monetary Fund. "Kuwait will also host a workshop on information security in the GCC and Arab countries with a view to sharing experience with other world-renowned experts, he added.