BSP to amend prudential reports using API

To strengthen surveillance of all banks, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) is planning to change the submission rules of 20 prudential reports that are migrating to the application programming interface (API) platforms. Based on draft guidelines released on Monday, June 5, the BSP will effectively amend the category and due date or submission deadlines, as well as the procedures of the 20 reports currently using the extensible mark-up language (XML) format through the API. To be amended are the following: the Basel 1.5 Capital Adequacy Ratio Report for stand-alone thrift banks and rural/cooperative banks; income statement on Retail Microfinance Operations and Report on Microfinance Products; Report on Compliance with Mandatory Credit Allocation which was required under Republic Act No. 6977; Report on Cross Border Financial Positions; and Report on Repurchase Agreements or the repo report of banks and quasi-banks. The API has also covered the following prudential reports which will be amended as well: Financial Reporting Package; Basel III Leverage Ratio; Basel III Capital Adequacy Report; Computation of the Risk-Based Capital Adequacy Ratio Covering Combined Credit, Market and Operational Risks; Expanded Report on Real Estate Exposures; Report on Electronic Money Transactions; Basel III Liquidity Coverage Ratio; Minimum Liquidity Ratio; Basel III Report on Net Stable Funding Ratio; Published Balance Sheet; Stress Testing Reports Covering Credit and Market Risks; Report on Project Finance Exposures, among others. The BSP in October 2021 implemented new rules to efficiently gather and process information from banks and non-banks which include the migration to the API-based prudential report submission. The migration to API platforms was adopted in stages for efficiency in data preparation and in the validation and processing of information by the BSP. Basically, API is a set of standard messages between two computer systems – such as BSP and the banks – for machine-to-machine submission and validation of reports. Besides XML, the API accepts other file formats such as MS Excel, PDF, CSV, among others. The BSP however, prefers XML because it restructures various reports to a single report, thus enabling a more streamlined reporting process. The BSP first announced the API adoption in 2019 to enable the BSP to eliminate significant human intervention in the reporting process. The API system will change the central bank’s regulatory reports process and will minimize risks related to human intervention and e-mail transmission of reports at less costs for BSP supervised financial institutions or BSFIs. The BSP on January 1 this year implemented the Advance Suptech Engine for Risk-based Compliance or ASTERisC\*. This marked the start of a digitalized supervisory and regulatory bank and non-bank processes. The BSP defines ASTERisC\* as a unified Regulatory and Supervisory Technology solution that streamlines and automates regulatory supervision, reporting, and compliance assessment of BSFIs' cybersecurity risk management systems and processes. As a cloud-based solution, ASTERisC\* supports the BSP's end-to-end process on cybersecurity supervision and oversight to include cyber-profiling, cyber incident reporting and cybersecurity control self-assessments, among others.