NorwayFinanstilsynet
Finanstilsynet backs keeping mortgage risk floors
Finanstilsynet recommends keeping the 25 per cent risk-weight floor for mortgages and 35 per cent for commercial-property loans when the current floors expire at year end, judging property-market risk still high.
By Taxxa AI OyPublished 18 September 2026
Industry: Financial service activities, except insurance and pension funding
Finanstilsynet recommends keeping the risk-weight floors for residential mortgages at 25 per cent and for commercial-real-estate loans at 35 per cent after the current floors expire at year end
Finanstilsynet. The assessment, sent to the Finance Ministry in a letter dated 18 September 2026Finanstilsynet, concludes that risk in the property markets is not materially changed since the ministry set the floors in December 2024FinanstilsynetFinanstilsynet, and that risk remains highFinanstilsynet.
The floors are a backstop for banks using internal models (IRB): they prevent residential and commercial-property loans from receiving excessively low risk weights in capital-requirement calculations given the prevailing systemic risk in these exposures. Finanstilsynet points to experience from earlier crises and sharp downturns, where losses on lending to commercial-property companies ran large and contributed to financial instability, and to household debt that remains high relative to disposable income both historically and compared with other countries. Neither the commercial-property risk nor the risk from high household mortgage debt has materially changed since December 2024, in its viewFinanstilsynet.
Continuing the floors keeps the risk weighting of both loan types at prudent levels and supports solvency in the Norwegian financial system, Finanstilsynet argues — the same mechanism the earlier consultation memo describes as lifting property-loan risk weights to prudent levels and strengthening the solidity of the financial system. The ministry commissioned the assessment with a consultation memo: its letter of 21 April 2026 asked Finanstilsynet to prepare a consultation note assessing whether the floors should be continued or changed once they expire at the turn of the yearFinanstilsynetFinanstilsynet.
The recommendation is not yet a decisionFinanstilsynet. IRB banks and other affected firms should treat continuation at 25 and 35 per cent as the supervisory proposal in the consultation memo the ministry commissionedFinanstilsynet, and follow the ministry's further process.
The proposal concerns the minimum average risk weights for IRB banks' Norwegian residential-mortgage and commercial-real-estate exposures.
Treat 25%/35% continuation as the supervisory proposal for year-end: hold capital planning on the current floors and track the Finance Ministry's process for final levels.