Aligning the tracks of Europe’s digital finance landscape will reinforce the euro’s global role, increase resilience against economic fragmentation and enhance European autonomy. Slow movers among European banks could face revenue and funding pressures.

Less dilution of equity capital certificates issued at a discount to book value would support savings banks’ credit profiles, but maintaining the cap on ECC holder representation on supervisory boards could have negative implications.

Germany, the Netherlands and Belgium need far more investment to modernise their electricity transmission grids through 2034 than southern European countries, hence the importance of having secured most of the EUR 200bn-plus in required funding.

Almost EUR 1.9bn has been repaid from 13 securitised CRE loans in 2025. This is below EUR 7.1bn of issuance, but the decrease in delinquent loans from 37% in 2024 to 21% offers some comfort around the performance and fundamentals of underlying properties.

August collections fell 53% from July, a sharper decline than the 42% of the previous three years. August always suffers seasonal effects of Italy’s national holidays but August 2025 collections were the lowest since this report's inception in 2020.

Corporate NPL ratios remain high, particularly in Germany, France, Austria and Belgium, while geopolitical risks and trade tensions have rendered the economic outlook uncertain. Our baseline of a moderate deterioration in asset quality remains intact.

Following MPS’s acquisition of Mediobanca and BPER’s takeover of BPSO, we expect Banco BPM to play a more active role in Italy’s banking consolidation wave, which is being driven by financial as well as strategic and political factors.

US plans to slap hefty tariffs on pharmaceutical imports have led European firms to speed up US investment and reset supply chains, the full credit impact of which will depend on the products targeted and whether the extra costs compromise innovation.

LANXESS moves to divest Envalior stake, supporting deleveraging strategy and investment-grade credit metrics

Europe’s real estate market will continue to diverge in credit quality amid residual investor nervousness about assets and owners exposed to refinancing risk, rising refurbishment costs, the uncertain economic outlook and adverse trends in demand.