Polish banks see WIBOR lawsuit pace slow

The legal noise is still real, but the trend is no longer a straight line higher. PKO Bank Polski remains the biggest target, with 1,070 suits, up 23.1% quarter on quarter. ING Bank Śląski reported 360 cases and mBank 345. Yet the banks are also increasingly pointing to favorable rulings, which is the key reason the litigation overhang is starting to look more manageable for investors than it did earlier this year.

ING said 39 cases had already ended in its favor by June 30, up from 27 at the end of 2025. mBank said it had received 13 final rulings in WIBOR-related cases and all were favorable. BNP Paribas Bank Polska reported 26 first-instance victories, seven of them final, against just one adverse but non-final judgment. In other words, the legal front is expanding, but it is not uniformly moving against lenders.

For the banking sector, that combination matters more than the absolute case count. The market does not need WIBOR litigation to disappear to re-rate Polish banks; it needs confidence that the eventual bill will be contained and that the courts will not force a disorderly repricing of mortgage books. The latest data support that more constructive view. Banks are still booking cases, but they are also accumulating precedent, and precedent is what eventually caps uncertainty.

The bigger issue now is timing. Three more preliminary questions on WIBOR are still pending before the Luxembourg court, including cases involving PKO BP and BNP Paribas Bank Polska. Those referrals will keep headline risk alive into 2027, just as WIBOR itself is due to fade from use and PKO BP prepares to adopt its successor from September. That transition reduces the market’s exposure to fresh legacy lending disputes, but it does not erase the stock of old contracts already in court.

For investors, the setup is straightforward: the legal risk has shifted from open-ended escalation to a slower grind, and that is a far better backdrop for bank valuations. Lenders with stronger balance sheets and better litigation execution should continue to outperform, while the smaller number of disclosures from institutions with heavy mortgage exposure keeps the sector’s risk premium from disappearing altogether. The opportunity now lies in the gap between still-high case counts and a legal environment that is becoming less hostile than bears assumed.

The next catalyst will be the next round of TSUE decisions and the extent to which courts continue to side with banks in first-instance rulings. If that pattern holds, the market will increasingly treat WIBOR as a legacy issue rather than a fresh threat — and that is when Polish banks can start reclaiming valuation upside.