Hysteresis and magnetoresistive properties of exchange coupled films Tb 24Co 76/Co/Fe 20Ni 80 containing ultrathin cobalt spacer were investigated in a wide temperature range. Temperature dependencies of the exchange bias field, coercivity, and anisotropic magnetoresistive effect of the permalloy layer were obtained for the films with various thicknesses of the cobalt spacer. The spacer was shown to cause changes in the temperature dependencies as well as in magnetization mechanism in the ferromagnetic layer. It was proposed, that these changes could be a consequence of the exchange coupling enhancement and involvement of the hard magnetic amorphous layer in the low-field magnetization process.