1. To limit its credit exposures to its clearing members further, a CCP shall maintain a pre-funded default fund to cover losses that exceed the losses to be covered by margin requirements laid down in Article 41, arising from the default, including the opening of an insolvency procedure, of one or more clearing members.

 The CCP shall establish a minimum amount below which the size of the default fund is not to fall under any circumstances.

2. A CCP shall establish the minimum size of contributions to the default fund and the criteria to calculate the contributions of the single clearing members. The contributions shall be proportional to the exposures of each clearing member.

3. The default fund shall at least enable the CCP to withstand, under extreme but plausible market conditions, the default of the clearing member to which it has the largest exposures or of the second and third largest clearing members, if the sum of their exposures is larger. A CCP shall develop scenarios of extreme but plausible market conditions. The scenarios shall include the most volatile periods that have been experienced by the markets for which the CCP provides its services and a range of potential future scenarios. They shall take into account sudden sales of financial resources and rapid reductions in market liquidity.