{"id":596,"date":"2026-09-24T12:40:38","date_gmt":"2026-09-24T16:40:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/?p=596"},"modified":"2026-09-24T12:40:39","modified_gmt":"2026-09-24T16:40:39","slug":"pledging-collateral-for-affiliate-borrowings-a-guarantee-in-disguise-under-reg-w","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/2026\/09\/24\/pledging-collateral-for-affiliate-borrowings-a-guarantee-in-disguise-under-reg-w\/","title":{"rendered":"Pledging Collateral for Affiliate Borrowings:  A &#8220;Guarantee&#8221; in Disguise under Reg W?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sometimes a guarantee does not look like a traditional guarantee. Consider the following: a bank pledges its own collateral to secure a borrowing made by an affiliate from a third-party lender. Is this a guarantee by the bank on behalf of the affiliate?<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>Yes<\/strong>. The Federal Reserve treats a bank&#8217;s pledge of collateral to secure an affiliate&#8217;s borrowing as a guarantee on behalf of the affiliate for purposes of Regulation W. The <em>covered transaction<\/em> amount is the lesser of: (i) the market value of the pledged collateral; or (ii) the amount of the borrowing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This interpretation, confirmed in a 1993 General Counsel opinion, makes economic sense. When the bank pledges its assets to secure an affiliate&#8217;s debt, the bank is <span style=\"text-decoration: underline\">effectively promising the lender that its assets will be available to satisfy the affiliate&#8217;s obligation if the affiliate defaults<\/span>. That is the functional equivalent of a guarantee.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The measurement as the lesser of collateral value or borrowing amount reflects the actual exposure. If the bank has pledged collateral <em>worth less than the full borrowing<\/em>, its maximum exposure is the collateral value. If the collateral <em>exceeds <\/em>the borrowing, the exposure is limited to the borrowing amount because that is all the lender can claim.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>DM Tip: <\/strong>Audit all instances where bank assets are pledged to secure obligations of any affiliate. Each such arrangement should be booked as a guarantee for Regulation W purposes, measured at the lesser of collateral market value or the secured obligation amount, and included in quantitative limit calculations.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Sometimes a guarantee does not look like a traditional guarantee. Consider the following: a bank pledges its own collateral to secure a borrowing made by an affiliate from a third-party lender. Is this a guarantee by the bank on behalf of the affiliate? Yes. The Federal Reserve treats a bank&#8217;s pledge of collateral to secure &hellip; <\/p>\n<p class=\"link-more\"><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/2026\/09\/24\/pledging-collateral-for-affiliate-borrowings-a-guarantee-in-disguise-under-reg-w\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<span class=\"screen-reader-text\"> &#8220;Pledging Collateral for Affiliate Borrowings:  A &#8220;Guarantee&#8221; in Disguise under Reg W?&#8221;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":693,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"ppma_author":[502],"class_list":["post-596","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"authors":[{"term_id":502,"user_id":693,"is_guest":0,"slug":"jsilvia","display_name":"Joseph E. Silvia","avatar_url":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/14\/2024\/09\/silviajoseph-100x100.jpg","author_category":"","last_name":"Silvia","first_name":"Joseph E.","job_title":"","user_url":"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/josephsilvia.html","description":"<a href=\"https:\/\/www.duanemorris.com\/attorneys\/josephsilvia.html\">Read Joseph's bio.<\/a>"}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/693"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=596"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":597,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/596\/revisions\/597"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=596"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=596"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=596"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.duanemorris.com\/bankinglaw\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=596"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}