In today’s news cycle, it seems barely a week goes by before another headline flitters across a social news feed about a data breach at some major U.S. or foreign company. Hackers and scams seem to abound across the marketplace, regardless of industry or any defining factor.
Cybersecurity itself has become an increasingly important issue for bank boards—84 percent of directors and executives responding to Bank Director’s 2018 Risk Survey earlier this year cited cybersecurity as one of the top categories of risk they worry about most. Facing the industry’s cyber threats has become a principal focus for many audit and risk committees as well, along with their oversight of other external and internal threats.
Technology’s influence in banking has forced institutions to come to terms with both the inevitability of not just integrating technology somewhere within the bank’s operation, but the risk that’s involved with that enhancement. Add to that the percolating influence of blockchain and cryptocurrency and the impending implementation of the new current expected credit loss (CECL) standards issued by the Financial Accounting Standards Board, and bank boards—especially the audit and risk committees within those boards—have been thrust into uncharted waters in many ways and have few points of reference on which to guide them, other than what might be general provisions in their charters.
And lest we forget, audit and risk committees still face conventional yet equally important duties related to identifying and hiring the independent auditor, oversight of the internal and external audit function, and managing interest rate risk and credit risk for the bank—all still top priorities for individual banks and their regulators.
The industry is also in a welcome period of transition as the economy has regained its health, which has influenced interest rates and driven competition to new heights, and the current administration is bent on rolling back regulations imposed in the wake of the 2008 crisis that have affected institutions of all sizes.
These topics and more will be addressed at Bank Director’s 2018 Audit & Risk Committees Conference, held June 12-13 at Swissôtel in Chicago, covering everything from politics and the economy to stress testing, CECL and fintech partnerships.
Among the headlining moments of the conference will be a moderated discussion with Thomas Curry, a former director of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. who later became the 30th Comptroller of the Currency, serving a 5-year term under President Barack Obama and, briefly, President Donald Trump.
Curry was at the helm of the OCC during a key time in the post-crisis recovery. Among the topics to come up in the discussion with Bank Director Editor in Chief Jack Milligan are Curry’s views on the risks facing the banking system and his advice for CEOs, boards and committees, and his thoughts about more contemporary influences, including the recently passed regulatory reform package and the shifting regulatory landscape.
