On 23 July 2020, the European Banking Authority (EBA) published guidelines that make available to Member State competent authorities a special procedure for the supervisory review and evaluation process (SREP) for the year 2020. The new guidelines identify how flexibility and pragmatism could be exercised in relation to the SREP framework in the context of the pandemic.

The guidelines focus on the key aspects of the SREP and cover the:

• Focus of the pragmatic SREP.
• Overall SREP assessment and scoring.
• Supervisory measures.
• Conduct of the SREP in cross-border contexts.

Member State competent authorities may continue to apply the EBA guidelines on the SREP as they currently stand, if they wish to do so. However, Member State competent authorities have the option to instead use the alternative process in the guidelines for the 2020 exercise, which may be necessary in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.