• Swedish banks urged to cut mortgage debt
• Sweden’s excessive household lending growth carries
risks for the wider economy: Moody’s

Bloomberg said Swedbank became the best capitalized major bank in Europe, overtaking Swedish competitor Svenska Handelsbanken, as the lender more than doubled its profit last quarter and said it held fewer risky assets.

“It seems contradictory that Swedbank, which according to the Swedish Financial Supervisory Authority’s and the Riksbank’s own stress tests has the lowest aggregate risks of any major Swedish bank, should have the highest capital requirement,” Chief Executive Officer Michael Wolf told the news-bureau.

Common equity Tier 1 under Basel III rules climbed to 20.9 percent of risk-weighted assets at the end of June, from 18.3 percent at the end of March, Swedbank said in a statement. Handelsbanken had a ratio of 20.1 percent compared with 19.5 percent at the end of March.