1.A credit institution's exposure to a client or group of connected clients shall be considered a large exposure where its value is equal to or exceeds 10 % of its own funds.
2.A credit institution shall report every large exposure within the meaning of paragraph 1 to the competent authorities. Member States shall provide that that reporting is to be carried out, at their discretion, in accordance with one of the following two methods: - reporting of all large exposures at least once a year, combined with reporting during the year of all new large exposures and any increases in existing large exposures of at least 20 % with respect to the previous communication, - reporting of all large exposures at least four times a year.
3.Exposures exempted under Article 4 (7) (a), (b), (c), (d), (f), (g) and (h) need not, however, be reported as laid down in paragraph 2. The reporting frequency laid down in the second indent of paragraph 2 may be reduced to twice a year for the exposures referred to in Article 4 (7) (e) and (i) to (s), (8), (9) and (10).
4.The competent authorities shall require that every credit institution have sound administrative and accounting procedures and adequate internal control mechanisms for the purpose of identifying and recording all large exposures and subsequent changes to them, as defined and required by this Directive, and for that of monitoring those exposures in the light of each credit institution's own exposure policies. Where a credit institution invokes paragraph 3, it shall keep a record of the grounds advanced for at least one year after the event giving rise to the dispensation, so that the competent authorities may establish whether it is justified.