Latest Regulation & Compliance reports and research: Finextra Research

Report

The Critical Role of Cloud in Digital and Operational Strategy

The operational challenges facing financial services firms are only increasing - from regulatory requirements to new entrants and now open banking and digital transformation - all at a time when competition has never been stronger. Fortunately, cloud computing services are constantly improving and maturing. Now banks can get more than cost-savings from their use of the cloud. It can improve cost management, enhance data security and data management, reduce operational risk, and enable banks to migrate to a more decentralised, digital and collaborative operating model. However, there are issues that banks, both new and old, must consider to optimise their use of the cloud, such as cultural challenges, skills shortages and operational obstacles. One way to overcome these challenges and ensure the most effective use of cloud technology is for banks to work with a growing number of expert organisations to support and manage their cloud migrations and digital transformations.

27 December 2019 929 downloads

Report

Clearing and Settlement: The new battleground for payments innovation

There is significant innovation and competition afoot in the world of payments initiation, driven by consumers and corporates on the demand side, and traditional banks, fintechs and challengers on the supply side. This is mirrored by what can reasonably be called a revolution in the world of clearing and settlement. Real-time / instant payments, blockchain and distributed ledger, new solutions to the old problems of cross-border correspondent banking, and many other initiatives all have the potential to transform how payments are processed, cleared and settled. Financial institutions therefore need to find ways to provide compelling business services based on new methods of payment initiation and novel customer experiences, while keeping pace with the multiplicity of back-end clearing and settlement options – all while managing costs, staying ahead of compliance, and growing market share.

12 November 2018 952 downloads

Report

Payment System Assurance – Reducing Risk through Effective Testing

Banks traditionally offer three services: accepting deposits, making loans and moving money. Once an area in which there was little competition and regulatory focus, today payments is a product led business that has changed beyond all recognition. Now banks and the infrastructure providers are at the centre of an environment which moves vast numbers of transactions and monetary value both domestically and internationally and often in real time. Against this backdrop there is increased regulatory legislation and compliance. All payments must be vetted to ensure both their authenticity and funding, and against various watch-lists – anti-money laundering, anti-terrorist financing etc. Further, the banks’ clients now expect the ability to initiate payment transactions from a gamut of devices from the ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and TMS (Treasury Management System) systems of large corporates to the mobile devices of millennials. The only certain feature of banks’ payments infra structure today is change, and the amount of change is at historically unprecedented levels. With the huge risks – business, financial, regulatory and reputational - to banks of failures in their payments infra structure, the importance of testing in this area has never been greater. Download this paper produced by Finextra and Iliad solutions examining the quality of the payments-related testing approaches and systems used by banks operating in the UK. It also sets out the obstacles currently preventing them from moving from limited automation and obsolete processes, to a completely new approach based on a strategic investment in technology to rationalise, simplify and fully automate their testing.

19 September 2018 472 downloads

Report

Meeting EU Regulatory Requirements in A Post Data Breach Era

2017 played host to a catalogue of data breaches, and some of the most shocking examples were those that were an updated account of previously reported breaches. This has done nothing to augment already dwindling trust in financial services. In the wake of the second Payment Services Directive (PSD2), the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) updates and AntiMoney Laundering (AML) updates with their regulatory requirements for stronger verification and more rigorous data protection, have current verification methods passed their expiry date? The plethora of digital account services available now has given rise to more opportunities for cyber criminals to breach customer account data- this can then be sold on the dark web and used for fraud and money laundering. At the same time, the rise of cryptocurrencies has enabled such nefarious activities by providing anonymity. What is the way forward for digital payment and service providers to know exactly who their customers are as they come under increased regulatory scrutiny? Download this new white paper, produced by Finextra in association with Mitek, as we explore these issues and highlights some of the emerging methods financial institutions can deploy to meet compliance obligations while onboarding their customers in a secure, user friendly manner.

04 June 2018 719 downloads