Banks are retroactively applying current regulatory standards to the pre-2020 WIBOR period, falsely claiming that a robust institutional oversight system existed before the implementation of the European BMR regulation.
The Illusion of Oversight
Legal representatives for banks increasingly argue that WIBOR was supervised prior to 2020, suggesting that credit agreements from that era benefited from systemic guarantees comparable to those provided by the EU’s BMR regulation. This narrative, designed to influence ongoing court disputes, relies on a chronological distortion.
Bank lawyers present a timeline starting with 1990s self-regulation, followed by ACI Polska and the 2013 establishment of the WIBOR Council, to claim continuous institutional oversight. This argument collapses under scrutiny, as a formal, comprehensive regulatory regime did not exist until Poland implemented the EU’s BMR framework.
The Origins and Limits of the 2013 WIBOR Council
Established in 2013 following LIBOR and EURIBOR manipulation scandals, the WIBOR Council was a response to “soft” European guidelines rather than a legal requirement. As an advisory body composed of industry representatives, it lacked independent access to data and could not verify the market reality of bank quotations.
The Council relied entirely on monthly reports provided by ACI Polska, the very organization it was supposedly overseeing. Crucially, the Council’s findings were not binding; the organizer maintained final decision-making power, proving that the system was built on industry self-regulation rather than genuine public oversight.
State Auditors Identified the Lack of Control
Long before the BMR regulation took effect, the Supreme Audit Office (NIK) repeatedly warned that the lack of external supervision over WIBOR created significant risks for market manipulation. Reports from 2014 and 2015 explicitly highlighted these deficiencies, despite the fact that the WIBOR Council was already in operation.
These findings confirm that the Council failed to function as an effective watchdog. The attempts to portray the pre-2020 era as a period of full, reliable supervision are inconsistent with both the Council’s own internal regulations and the critical assessments provided by state auditors at the time.
The BMR Standard vs. Historical Reality
The EU’s BMR regulation, which came into force in 2018, mandates that benchmark administrators must possess formal organizational structures, internal controls, and independent audit processes. None of these criteria were met by the WIBOR Council, which remained an opinion-forming body lacking legal accountability.
Trying to retroactively apply BMR-era logic to the period before 2020 is a strategic attempt to discredit the arguments of borrowers. Courts must recognize that the difference between industry self-regulation and external, public oversight is a fundamental distinction, not a matter of nomenclature.