S&P will take up the enhanced Covered Bond Label Harmonised Transparency Template (HTT) for the production of its surveillance reports to meet new ECB minimum disclosure requirements, the rating agency said on Friday, while warning that timeliness will depend on issuers.

The announcement came a day after the Covered Bond Label Foundation announced additions to maturity extension disclosure on the Label website and a voluntary addendum for the HTT, aimed at aligning the initiative with European Central Bank requirements for rating agencies which will have to be met for covered bonds to retain eligibility under the central bank’s collateral framework.

“We note that the revised HTT contains most of the information required to produce the surveillance reports, and therefore we will accept the revised HTT for the production of the surveillance reports,” the rating agency said.

It noted that under the ECB minimum disclosure requirements for covered bond ratings, it must publish a full report when assigning a rating and quarterly surveillance reports for programmes to meet the credit standards of the Eurosystem’s European credit assessment framework (ECAF).

S&P said that its ability to meet an eight-week deadline after the end of each quarter will depend on information being provided to it in a timely manner.

“We note that most of the issuers currently publish investor reports between four and six weeks after the end of the quarter,” the rating agency said. “It may not be possible to satisfy the ECB requirement, to publish the surveillance reports within eight weeks from the end of the quarter, if issuers provide the information toward the end of that eight-week period.”

The ECB on 8 March clarified that surveillance reports need to be prepared for the first time by 25 November, eight weeks after the end of the third quarter.