• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to footer
The Evolution of ESG RegulationThe Evolution of ESG RegulationThe Evolution of ESG Regulation

CUBE global

  • Products
        • RegPlatform product overviewOur enterprise product, providing regulatory intelligence for large, global financial institutions looking to tackle complex compliance.
        • RegAssure product overviewOur highly intuitive, seamless compliance product, that grows with your small or medium sized business.
        • CUBE's technology
  • Solutions
        • PrivacyGlobal governance for data privacy regulations, the world over
        • RecordsHolistic oversight of ever-growing regulations for records
        • CybersecurityAutomated workflows for up to date, relevant data on cyber
        • Technology riskEffective policies and controls to mitigate technology risk
        • Financial crime and AMLWatertight audit trails to show risk-based rationale
        • View all solutions
  • Resources
        • Resource hubLifting the lid on financial services, compliance, and regulation
        • Read

        • Case Studies
        • Blog posts
        • Reports
        • RegNews
        • Brochures
        • Find

        • Compliance Corner
        • Compliance confessions
        • ESG Conference
        • CUBE’s regulation game
        • Listen

        • Videos
        • Webinars
        • Podcasts
  • Partners
        • Advisory and consulting partnersEnhance your regulatory compliance offering with the entire suite of CUBE regulatory data.
        • Integration partnersCompliance is complex enough without over-complicated integration procedures.
        • Technology partnersAdd value to existing customer applications with a unified window into regulatory intelligence.
        • Partners overview
  • About us
        • About usThe story of who we are, how we got here and why we’re exceptionally proud of what we do
        • TeamThe visionaries and leaders powering CUBE’s success
        • NewsThe latest news from CUBE
        • CareersOur movement to transform regulatory data into regulatory intelligence
        • ContactWant to know more? Get in touch
  • Request a demo
Customer login
Home » Resources » Webinar extract: Banking with Biden – Is regulatory mandated RegTech on the horizon?

January 7, 2022

Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

Webinar extract: Banking with Biden – Is regulatory mandated RegTech on the horizon?

In light of the recent US election result, Mitch Avnet, CEO of Compliance Risk Concepts sat down with Rob Fulcher to unpick what a Biden win might mean for the future of finance. In this extract, Rob and Mitch discuss whether regulatory mandated RegTech may be on the horizon.

In light of the recent US election result, with a Biden victory confirmed, CUBE’s Rob Fulcher sat down with compliance luminary, Mitch Avnet, CEO of Compliance Risk Concepts, to unpick what a Biden win might mean for the future of finance. During the webcast, the audience were encouraged to submit any pressing questions.

In the below extract, Rob and Mitch discuss whether we’re ever likely to see financial regulators insist that financial institutions use regulatory technology in their compliance programs.

At the moment firms are implementing technology because it’s ‘good to have’ and it’s helpful. But do you think there’ll be a move from the regulators to say ‘you need to have this’ or ‘your compliance systems aren’t good enough if you don’t have technology in place’?

Mitch Avnet: Great question. I think part of where firms get frustrated with US regulators is when you ask a very pointed question like that and the SEC or FINRA is never going to tell you how to satisfy your program. They’re going to tell you that you have to have a program in place that is right and calibrated to who you are and what you do. They’re not going to tell you how to go from A to B.

With that said, I think we can all agree that investments in technology can be very impactful to organizations, especially if it takes people out of doing the hunting and gathering of information every day and enables them to move into more value-added roles within compliance or within an organization where they’re actually serving more in an advisory capacity.

We have a huge ask on us to gather massive volumes of information and figure out how that ultimately impacts our organisation.

Any time you rely on technology to help you there, I think that’s a good thing. Especially it if helps you to redeploy your capital assets in a positive and impactful manner. Having said that, I would be hard pressed to think of any regulator that would tell you that you need to do that. In fact, I would take it a step further, and say that I would never ask a regulator how I should run my program.

Rob Fulcher: To add to that, to tie it back to today’s topic; if there’s a relationship between the Administrations and the financial services sector, what we saw under Obama as a reaction to the global financial crash was all these new regulations. Within the financial services sector we saw a reaction in terms of budgets and spend and resources coming into place – and new technologies.

What we have found at CUBE over the last four years is that some of those budgets have been pulled back, but yet the need to address the regulations has increased.

Essentially firms are being asked to do more for less – which actually has been good for CUBE and other technology providers and service providers out there because there’s this need to become more efficient.

CUBE is looking at automating regulatory monitoring, classification of regulations, mapping of regulations to policies and controls and internal taxonomies. In the past that was done by excel and people and I agree Mitch, you’re never going to get a regulator that will come in and say, ‘you need to look at CUBE’ or ‘you need to look at this new technology’. But I think generally there’s an acceptance that managing everything through spreadsheets and trying to introduce an auditable workflow through spreadsheets and files is an old technique and an old process. And when you’re looking at Tier 1 firms across multiple countries, it’s very difficult to manage regulatory change in that respect.

MA: I think that’s a great point. And unfortunately, you see some of the biggest investments and the best compliance programs coming out of where firms have been hit by a regulator because their processes broke down or their processes couldn’t keep up with the pace of the business.

So, what happens in the most part – to be completely candid and realistic here – is that most firms will not be altruistic and make those investments upfront because they want to have the best compliance program or regulatory change management program money can buy. If you work in a firm like that then that’s amazing. But it’s human nature – you get religion when you get slapped. And depending how badly you get slapped the more religion.

In all seriousness, the best compliance programs come out of the worst regulatory situations. And people know that. To use a line from a holiday song – they’re not doing it ‘to be good for goodness sake’ they’re doing it because they’ve been mandated to do it. In terms of corporate, social responsibility and who you are and how you present yourself to the investing public, does that look good? No. Investors, clients, they want to know that you have those controls and that governance in place.

Firms put the money where the revenue generating projects are and it all comes down to how you build the business case to show that putting the infrastructure in place, having the processes matched to technology to automate those workflows is going to make you a profit centre.
Watch the Webinar in full

Related resources
View all resources
Sylvia Yarbough whispers to a colleague about the key to customer complaints
Blogs

Compliance Confessionals – How does a CCO stay organized?

resilience
Blogs

Get ready for new digital resilience obligations

Department of Justice (DOJ) and new regulations
Blogs

The DOJ’s take on corporate criminal enforcement policies

Blogs

Why is a whistleblower policy important? 


Want CUBE updates and latest industry news sent straight to your inbox?

Footer

Add CUBE logo here

  • Products
    • Partners
    • Solutions
  • Resource hub
    • Blogs
    • Reports
    • Brochures
    • Compliance Corner
    • Webinars
    • Podcasts
    • Videos
  • Behind CUBE
    • About us
    • Meet the team
    • Careers
    • News US
    • Contact us
  • The legal bits
    • Privacy policy
    • Cookie policy
    • Terms of use
    • Accessibility
Follow us:
  • LinkedIn
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

© 2023 CUBE Content Governance Global Limited

  • English
  • US