Sberbank's switch to IRB approach lifts capital ratio

Sberbank’s embrace of the internal ratings-based approach (IRB) for credit risk – part of its transition to using Basel III advanced rules for capital adequacy – helped it on its way to an improved Common Equity Tier 1 (CET1) ratio in 2018.

The Russian lender posted an 11.85% CET1 capital ratio at end-2018 under Basel's advanced approach, up from 11.2% on January 1 when its requirements were calculated solely under the standardised approach.

A capital build-up of 475 billion rubles ($7