MyComplianceOffice Blog

Managing a financial trading control room involves balancing a wide variety of tasks. To comply with stringent rules and regulations, all deals must be carefully reviewed, the flow of information strictly managed, and an overarching focus on preventing conflicts of interest must be a constant. Without effective processes, a single deal can move slowly through the pipeline—and those delays aren’t beneficial for the firm’s bottom line. 

If you work in the financial services industry, you know how important it is to have clear, consistent, and compliant policies and procedures. Policies and procedures enable firms to align operations with strategic objectives, meet regulatory requirements, and foster a culture of accountability and transparency.

But managing policies and procedures is often easier said than done. It can be a complex and challenging endeavor to create, update, communicate, and enforce policies and procedures across the firm—and to ensure policy stays up to date in times of flux and uncertainty.

The long-awaited Financial Accountability Regime (FAR Bill) will come into effect for the Australian banking industry on 15 March 2024 and for the Australian superannuation and insurance industries on 15 March 2025.

In recent months the SEC and CFTC have charged multiple Wall Street firms with widespread recordkeeping failures, handing down staggering penalties in excess of 1.5 billion dollars. Firms—including smaller ones—should only expect that the aggressive enforcement will continue.  And the SEC's Division of Examinations 2024 Priorities only reinforce the agency's continued focus on the importance of record keeping and demonstrable compliance. 

Are your books and records ready to stand up to regulatory scrutiny?

Employees at all levels of the organization make decisions that impact compliance every single day. To ensure that those decisions are wise ones, employees need to understand where they fit into the organization. If there's not a shared understanding of roles and responsibilities supported by controls and accountability there's a risk of chaotic compliance—and a chaotic culture across the firm.