remain vigilant of these developments in this unchartered area of cyberspace. consistent with our mandate of ensuring the stability, safety, and efficiency of the country ’ s financial system, the bangko sentral will continue to adopt a comprehensive, agile, risk - based, and engaging approach toward cybersecurity. this approach cuts across three key areas : first, our regulatory policy framework ; second, proactive monitoring through our surveillance capabilities ; and finally, promoting resilience through supervisory and oversight activities. since 2013, the bsp has issued several regulations to address cyber - related risks for our supervised financial institutions. these regulations deal on various facets of technology such as social media risk management, business continuity management, multi - factor authentication, cybersecurity, electronic payments and financial services, virtual assets, and open finance. we recently released advisories on control measures against cyber fraud and attacks on retail electronic payments and financial services, and security controls for application programming interface. likewise, we amended our regulations to enhance provisions on fraud management and technology outsourcing. at this point, allow me to share some major industry - wide initiatives to strengthen the industry ’ s cyber defenses and overall resilience. • first, the bsp is developing the financial services cyber resilience plan that will serve as the primary framework covering strategies and plans to strengthen cyber resilience in the financial services industry. this is part of bsp ’ s role as the lead in the banking sector computer emergency response team under the department of information and communications technology. • second, we are implementing the advanced suptech engine for risk - based compliance, or what we call asterisc *, which is a unified regtech and suptech solution that will streamline and automate regulatory supervision, reporting, and compliance assessment of cybersecurity risk management for our supervised institutions. • third, we engage with the banking industry through the bankers association of the philippines cyber incident database or bapcid. bapcid is a web - based portal and an industry cyberthreat and best practices sharing platform where participants can report incidents and threats anonymously, and receive threat intelligence feeds and threat advisories from the bsp. • lastly, we are currently coordinating with relevant government agencies and industry associations for a joint consumer protection campaign to amplify our messages and raise overall cyber awareness in the country. in closing, as we explore the opportunities offered by the metaverse, we must remain vi

– is a time - varying capital requirement designed to make the banking system more resilient and less pro - cyclical by requiring firms to hold more capital at the appropriate time so they are prepared for a downturn. finally, the other systemically important institutions ( o - sii ) buffer looks to build additional resilience for institutions whose failure would have a systemic impact on the economy and the financial system. in considering prevailing mortgage rates, a number of factors need to be taken into account. these include : historical default rates and the levels of npls in irish residential mortgage portfolios ; mortgages in ireland continue to be issued at relatively high loan - to - value ratios, when compared to levels within other jurisdictions ; the small scale of the irish market means that the cost base is higher, in view of the increasing importance of fixed costs in banking ( including the cost of it systems ) ; lower levels of mortgage switching in ireland than that observed in many other european markets ; and the limited number of banks reduces competitive pressures on pricing margins. addressing npls in a sustainable way that provides strong protections for borrowers remains a priority. this is essential in ensuring the resilience of the banking system and borrowers alike, since elevated levels of npls compromise the capacity of both lenders and debtors to weather future downturns. the central bank, as the national competent authority and as part of the single supervisory mechanism ( ssm ), continues to require banks to reduce npls in a sustainable way. the stock of npls held by the retail banks has declined by €67. 2bn ( c. 79 percent ) since the 2013 peak. multiple tools have been used to enable this reduction, including : re - engaging with borrowers ; restructures ; accounting write downs ; engaging through the insolvency service ; loan sales ; loan securitisations ; and seeking resolution through the courts. the approach taken by the central bank and other parts of the state consumer protection framework has ensured that the reduction in the level of non - performing mortgages has been primarily achieved through the restructuring of loans. the code of conduct on mortgage arrears ( ccma ) has played a critical role in ensuring that borrowers are protected. the ccma, and within it, the mortgage arrears resolution process, require that repossession be used only as a last resort. the number of mortgage accounts for principal dwelling houses ( pdhs ) in arrears over