The Reserve Bank of India has issued its Eleventh Amendment Directions on capital adequacy for commercial banks, amending Chapter VII of the 2025 Directions to align with the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision's 2017 leverage ratio standard.

Under the revised rules, domestic systemically important banks must maintain a minimum leverage ratio of 4 per cent, while other banks must maintain 3.5 per cent. Branches of global systemically important banks in India must hold 3.5 per cent plus any leverage ratio buffer applicable to them as G-SIBs, including any additional buffer set by their home regulator.

G-SIB branches that fail to meet their leverage ratio buffer requirement will face capital distribution constraints. The severity of those constraints depends on the branch's CET1 risk-based ratio and its Tier 1 leverage ratio, with minimum capital conservation ratios ranging from 100 per cent of earnings at the lowest bands down to zero for branches comfortably above both thresholds.