Raiffeisen Bank International (RBI)

Is Raiffeisen Bank International safe?

For ordinary deposits within the guarantee limit, yes. Raiffeisen Bank International (RBI) reported a CET1CET1 ratioA bank's highest-quality capital (mainly shares and retained profits) as a share of its risk-weighted assets. Higher means more room to absorb losses.More in the glossary capital ratio of 18.3% at 30 June 2026 against a 12.04% requirement, and a liquidity coverage ratioLiquidity coverage ratioA bank's cash and easy-to-sell assets compared with the money that could flow out in a 30-day crisis. It must be at least 100%.More in the glossary of 136%. Even if its Russian bank were written offHull lossAn accident in which an aircraft is destroyed or damaged beyond economic repair. People may or may not be hurt.More in the glossary, RBI says the ratio would be 15.5%. We still score it only 66/100, near the bottom of the large European banks we cover. The reason is Russia: RBI still owns a bank there, the Russian central bank has taken about €2.4 billion from that unit to enforce Russian court rulings, and US authorities have been asking questions about its sanctions compliance since 2023.

Which bank holds your money

RBI is the Vienna-based central institution of the Austrian Raiffeisen group, about 61% owned by the regional Raiffeisen banks. Its retail customers are mostly in Central and Eastern Europe, each with a separate local bank.

RBI AG and its Austrian bank subsidiaries belong to the Raiffeisen institutional protection scheme, in which members commit to support each other's liquidity and solvency. Together with ÖRS it is recognised by the Austrian regulator as a statutory deposit guarantee scheme. That mutual support is a plus, but it does not raise the €100,000 legal limit.

The Russia problem

RBI kept its Russian subsidiary, AO Raiffeisenbank, after the 2022 invasion and has been shrinking it under pressure from the ECB and the US. In April 2024 RBI said it expected the ECB to require it to cut Russian customer loans by up to 65% by 2026 compared with late 2023. By June 2026 those loans were €2.5 billion, down from about €13.7 billion in mid-2022, and the unit held more equity (€6.5 billion) than loans. RBI calls run-down its base case and says it will try again to sell.

The Rasperia case shows the cost of staying. Rasperia, a Russian company whose shares in the Austrian construction firm STRABAG are frozen under EU sanctions, sued STRABAG's other major shareholders and RBI's Russian bank in Kaliningrad. In January 2025 the court awarded Rasperia €2.044 billion, enforceable against AO Raiffeisenbank, and in 2025 the Russian central bank took about €2.1 billion from the bank's correspondent account. A second judgment led to a further €326 million being taken in March 2026. On 30 July 2026 RBI filed a claim in Austria for about €3.15 billion against Rasperia's frozen assets there, which it considers highly likely to succeed.

Sanctions inquiries and fines

RBI disclosed that it received a request for information from the US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control in January 2023, about payments involving US correspondent banks and Russia, and that it has cooperated with a US Justice Department inquiry since March 2023. Neither inquiry has reached a public conclusion. In September 2026 a short seller accused RBI of facilitating sanctions evasion; on 5 October RBI said an internal review of nearly 200 items found it had followed its sanctions policies.

Older and smaller cases add to the record. Austria's FMA fined RBI €2.7 million in 2018 over customer due diligence documentation, which a court cut to €2 million in 2024, and €2.07 million in 2024 over checks on correspondent banks; RBI is still contesting both. Polish regulator fines of PLN 55 million, imposed on its former Polish bank in 2018 and taken over by RBI when that bank was sold, are final, and foreign currency mortgage litigation in Poland cost it €146 million in the first half of 2026.

Capital and liquidity

The ratio that matters is the one without Russia, because RBI cannot freely move capital or profits out of its Russian bank. On that basis it expects about 14.3% at the end of 2026, after buying Garanti BBVA's Romanian business for €591 million, a buffer of a little over two points.

How to keep your money safe

1. Find the legal entity on your contract. A Raiffeisen account in Prague, Bratislava or Bucharest is covered by that country's scheme, not Austria's.
2. Keep balances within €100,000, or the local limit, per bank.
3. In non-EU markets such as Serbia or Albania, check the national guarantee limit, which may be lower than €100,000.
4. Approve payments only in your bank's app. Fake calls posing as bank security staff are common across the region.

How we scored it

Liquidity (76), deposit protectionDeposit insuranceA government-backed scheme that repays bank customers up to a set limit if their bank fails, such as the FDIC in the US or the FSCS in the UK.More in the glossary (74) and capital (72) are adequate, with a solid requirement buffer even without Russia. Conduct (45) is the weakest factor because of open US sanctions inquiries and repeated regulatory fines, and stability history (55) reflects the 2009 state capital and the losses in Russia. Compare UniCredit, another European bank still winding down a Russian unit.