Whitepaper

 

Reducing Behavioural Risk in the dealing room

14 November 2014

This whitepaper touches on a number of issues relating to dealing room behaviours, based on recent developments in the enforcement arena (Libor) and in regulatory guidance and expectation. Possible scenarios for management involve the observation and monitoring of behaviours. It is important to debate the issues, which are complex and cross the divide of regulatory expectation and modern behavioural risk management. Developments in the field are moving fast and will raise many complex compliance and (risk) management challenges for firms.The challenge is to quickly recognize when behaviour poses an unacceptable risk to the firm and its senior management. Complex firms face greater challenges. This is something distinct from fundamentally changing behaviours in dealing room environments a topic which should be approached with caution. First there must a focus on understanding and mitigating behavioural risk.

Timeliness is increasingly being defined as: immediately or near to immediately, because of the speed of the market and the technology that supports the market.

Paul Westcott

Paul Westcott

Senior Product Manager Compliance at Dun & Bradstreet Ltd.

Why BCBS 239 matters to everybody – not just Financial Services

07 November 2014

In my role as Product Manager in the compliance space, I am very fortunate to have a number of colleagues in different disciplines that I regularly have ‘water cooler’ conversations with (or more often on the comfy chairs in the coffee break out area as I am a sucker for good coffee). One such person I regularly touch base with is data governance expert Malcom Chisolm. Malcom is well known as an independent consultant with over 25 years of experience in data-related disciplines, and has worked in a variety of sectors including finance, manufacturing, government, pharmaceuticals, telecoms. He asked me a simple question, “What are you doing around BCBS 239”?  Continue reading…

Understand clients’ business models to stay relevant

03 November 2014

Insurers who adapt to the changing needs of their business clients will succeed in future over those who stick to traditional insurance approaches, Airmic has told underwriters. Paul Hopkin, the association’s technical director, challenged the market to innovate to restore relevance – but stressed that new products must address the needs of 21st century business models. Continue reading…

Bruno Colmant

Bruno Colmant

Head of Macro Research Bank Degroof Petercam

The real crisis is about the role of government

30 October 2014
Knowledge Base

Various labels – subprime, bank lending, sovereign debt and monetary – have been used since 2008 to describe the economic crisis. Yet its scope doubtlessly extends far beyond these spheres. The crisis poses a fundamental question for society about the role of government, squeezed between unpredictable global corporations and public debt that requires refinancing to guarantee social order. Gorged on debt, governments are hostages to banking sectors, themselves prisoners of central banks that need to support private enterprise by constantly providing liquidity. Continue reading…

Your Trade Credit Risk policy and your AML policy – Poles apart or 2 sides of the same coin ?

29 October 2014
Knowledge Base

It is a well-worn phrase “we need to do more with less”! Or in other words, can we ensure that more than one task we have to do in our day jobs can be incorporated in a single effort to ‘gain efficiencies’ or, in real speak, ultimately save money ? So I thought I would look at a typical AML and typical Trade Credit policy and see just how different or similar they were. Now, I do not profess to be a compliance officer nor have I had the stress of being a CFO so I will accept that the devil is always in the detail. However, here are just a few areas I thought seemed to have a very real sense of similarity. Here are just five examples.

Continue reading…

Results of the EU-wide stress test for Banks

26 October 2014

Just before the European Central Bank (ECB) takes over the regulation of the 123 big banks in Europe on November 4th, the European Banking Authority (EBA) publishes the results of the EU-wide stress test. The purpose of the stress test is to test how healthy banks are, how is the resilience of the EU-banks at adverse economic developments. The EU-wide stress test is coordinated by the EBA and carried out in cooperation with the European Central Bank (ECB), the European Systemic Risk Board (ESRB), the European Commission (EC) and the Competent Authorities (CAs) from all relevant national jurisdictions. Continue reading…