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Poland · EU member

Polish Financial Supervision Authority

KNF · Financial supervisory authorityMeasured

68Activity Indexmethodology →

Employees

1,476

· FTE positions

FY2025

Annual budget

PLN 680m (~€158m)

FY2025

Supervised entities

~2,000

FY2025

Overview

Poland's KNF is a standalone supervisor funded entirely by levies on the firms it oversees — the NBP, Poland's central bank, has a seat on the Commission but no supervisory role. The scale is unlike anywhere else in the region: 195,057 licensing and registry actions in 2025, and a mediation programme that settled over 5,400 CHF-mortgage disputes in a single year. Everything below is the KNF's own data, from its FY2025 annual report.

Regulated sectors

BanksPayment institutionsE-money institutionsInvestment firmsCrypto-asset service providersInsurance companies

Leadership

  • Jacek JastrzębskiChair · since 2018
  • Marcin MikołajczykDeputy Chair
  • Krystian WierciochDeputy Chair
  • Dariusz AdamskiDeputy Chair · since 2025

Full board →

Figures as published by Polish Financial Supervision Authority for FY2025. Source: Sprawozdanie z działalności UKNF oraz KNF w 2025 roku (Adopted by KNF 26 June 2026; approved by the Chair 1 July 2026). Data as of 31 December 2025.

Organisation

The staff measure here is FTE positions. At 1,475.63 FTE against the PLN 680m allocation, spend per FTE is roughly €107,000. FX: ~4.30 PLN/EUR.

ItemValue
Positions
1,475.63 FTE
Full-time equivalents at 31 December 2025
Task-based budget allocation for financial market supervision
PLN 680,374,000 (~€158m)
Planned allocation (budżet zadaniowy), not executed. Drawn from the FY2024 report while the staff figure above is FY2025 — flagged as such until the FY2025 edition confirms whether it restates the number.

Structure

Two distinct entities, both covered by the same report: KNF — the Commission, a collegiate body (Chair, three Deputy Chairs, nine members: six voting, three advisory); and UKNF — the Office serving it, which employs the staff. UKNF has been a state legal person since 1 January 2019, funded directly by levies on supervised entities, not the state budget. Seven organisational divisions at year end, plus seven units outside the division structure. NBP is Poland's central bank and is not the financial supervisor — the NBP President (or a delegated Board member) sits on KNF as a voting member.

ItemValue
Composition of the Commission
Chair · 3 Deputy Chairs · 9 members (6 voting, 3 advisory)
Funding basis
State legal person since 1 January 2019 — funded by levies on supervised entities, not the state budget
Organisational shape (year-end 2025)
7 organisational divisions · 7 units outside the division structure

Supervised entities — Banking (31 December 2025)

Scope totals: core supervised institutions ~2,000 · plus intermediaries and agents ~38,000 · non-supervised registers add a further ~220,000. Poland's report draws the supervised / merely-registered line unusually explicitly.

ItemValue
Commercial banks (incl. 2 associating)
29
State bank
1
Cooperative banks
488
Branches of credit institutions
35
Representative offices of foreign banks and credit institutions
13
Institutional Protection Schemes
3
Credit unions (SKOK) incl. National SKOK
19

Supervised entities — Capital market (31 December 2025)

ItemValue
Brokerage houses
27
Banks conducting brokerage activity
9
Investment funds
559
Sub-funds
672
Fund management companies (TFI)
55
AIF managers (ASI)
326
Other fund servicing entities
98
Agents of investment firms
258
Custodian banks
12
Capital market infrastructure entities
6
Issuers on the regulated market
467
Issuers in the alternative trading system
432

Supervised entities — Insurance (31 December 2025)

ItemValue
Life insurers
21
Non-life insurers and reinsurers
30
Insurance brokers
1,422
Reinsurance brokers
60
Insurance agents
28,094

Supervised entities — Pensions (31 December 2025)

ItemValue
Open pension funds
8
Pension societies (PTE)
8
Employee pension funds / societies
2 / 2
Voluntary pension funds
6, plus 19 defined-date
PEPP (OIPE) providers
2

Supervised entities — Payments and other (31 December 2025)

ItemValue
National payment institutions
47
Small payment institutions
168
Payment service bureaus
837
Account information service providers
9
National e-money institutions
1
Mortgage credit intermediaries
823
Agents of mortgage credit intermediaries
7,211
Lending institutions
97
Credit servicers
1 domestic, 2 cross-border
Crowdfunding service providers
4
Benchmark administrators
1

Registers of entities KNF does NOT supervise (31 December 2025)

Registered but not supervised — KNF maintains the registers only. Kept as its own block per the Polish report, never merged into the supervised totals.

ItemValue
Persons performing agency activities (OFWCA)
170,251
Consumer credit intermediaries
41,293
Securities brokers
3,722
Investment advisers
1,041
Actuaries
461
Pawnbroking businesses
230
Foreign investment firms (freedom to provide services)
690
Foreign insurers notified under freedom to provide services
582
Notified insurance intermediaries
4,094
Foreign investment funds / sub-funds
81 / 1,086

Supervisory activity 2025

Banking priorities for 2025: capital requirement calculation for credit and operational risk; product risk and distribution; interest rate risk in the banking book; liquidity crisis preparedness. Four commercial banks and 13 cooperative banks were under recovery plans.

ItemValue
Licensing and registry actions taken (domestic entities)
195,057
KNF meetings
13, plus 27 circular votes
KNF resolutions adopted
535 (338 decisions, 19 orders)
Administrative decisions and orders under delegated authority
2,785 (2,267 decisions, 518 orders)
Financial reports and returns analysed
over 185,000
Reports of potential irregularities received
6,408
— insurance and intermediaries
3,438
— banks
1,853
— capital market
773
— lending institutions
180
— non-bank payment providers
120
— credit unions
33
Final SREP/BION — commercial banks
27, plus 54 quarterly risk-indicator reviews and 27 updates
Final SREP/BION — cooperative and associating banks
490, plus 1,916 quarterly updates
BION — insurers
47 (20 life, 27 non-life), plus 5th edition for insurance groups
BION — TFI / brokerage houses / pension societies
55 / 24 / 8
Recovery plan applications reviewed
22
Complaints lodged at the Voivodeship Administrative Court
82
Cassation filings or responses at the Supreme Administrative Court
28
Prospectuses approved
18, plus 43 supplements
Recommendations issued to issuers to cease disclosure breaches
163, to 67 issuers
Major-shareholding and managers' transaction notifications verified
2,381 and 2,351
Public company reports published
~19,500
Outsourcing policies reviewed (insurers)
48, with supervisory action against 42

KNF Court of Arbitration

The CHF mortgage settlement programme has been running since October 2021: 6,624 proceedings initiated in 2025 — nearly 91% of all mediations; 7,463 concluded; 5,485 ended in settlement — a settlement rate above 73%. Thirty-three financial institutions consented to mediation; sixteen initiated it themselves. Thirteen firms received the "Financial institution friendly to mediation" distinction. No other European regulator operates anything comparable at this scale.

ItemValue
Total cases
8,479 (8,472 mediation, 7 arbitration)
— banking sector
6,935
— insurance sector
1,540
Consents to proceed
7,283
Refusals to proceed
597
Registered mediators / arbitrators
282 / 38

Market context 2025

ItemValue
Total Polish financial sector assets
~PLN 4,935bn (~€1,148bn)
Domestic commercial banks 66.6%; fund management companies 11.6%
Public offerings of shares
507 offers worth PLN 20,397m
Including 10 IPOs worth PLN 2,007m

Other 2025 notes

ItemValue
Erste Group Bank AG / Santander Bank Polska
KNF cleared Erste Group Bank AG to acquire control of Santander Bank Polska S.A., Poland's third-largest commercial bank by assets; transaction completed 9 January 2026
IBK Bank Polska S.A.
Authorised to commence operations, following the 2024 licence granted to Industrial Bank of Korea
First-ever use against a foreign insurer
On 16 April 2025 KNF prohibited Insurance JSC "DallBogg: Life and Health" (Sofia) from writing motor third-party liability business in Poland, citing an organisational structure unsuited to its Polish activity and consequent claims-handling failures
Motor third-party liability enforcement
A PLN 1.3m fine imposed on one insurer over pricing adequacy, with proceedings opened against two others
Sustainability reporting (first year under ESRS)
134 issuers subject for FY2024; seven reported for the first time
Supervisory remit expanded during 2025
Credit servicers, DORA, European green bonds
Fund comparison tool (Wybieram fundusze)
Built during 2025 for release in 2026

Key legislation

  • Banking Act of 29 August 1997

    Prawo bankowe — CRD/CRR framework

  • Act on Financial Market Supervision of 21 July 2006

    Establishing statute for KNF

  • Act on Trading in Financial Instruments of 29 July 2005

    Investment services (MiFID II)

  • Payment Services Act of 19 August 2011

    PSD2 transposition

Public registers

Application portals

Recent publications

Data as of 31 December 2025 · Source: www.knf.gov.pl + ComplyBridge researchActivity Index methodology →

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