Credit unions to be stress-tested

THE Central Bank is sending financial experts to each of the state’s 414 credit unions — holding €12 billion in customer deposits — to stress-test their capability to withstand further bad loan write-offs.

A Central Bank spokesperson confirmed that the new series of stress tests will take place over the coming two months.

“Credit unions will be subject to a stress-testing exercise in the first quarter of 2011 to determine the capacity of the capital position of individual credit unions to withstand certain stressed scenarios and to assess the resultant level of any additional capital required by individual credit unions,” the spokesman said.