↑ Grab this Headline Animator

Launch of Important European Event Looking at Compliance in the Financial...

Epsilon Events and Houston Consulting Europe are organizing a one-day interactive seminar looking at Compliance in the Financial Sector at the Meridian Hotel in Brussels on 19 October. The event will bring together policy-makers and practitioners to review and develop solutions to issues of compliance in the financial sector arising in connection with EU policy, regulation and legislation. It will be interactive, with strong audience participation encouraged throughout.



Compliance is the buzzword in financial services today. Wherever one looks - securities market rules, accounting standards, money laundering safeguards or prudential supervision, moves to higher levels of compliance are visible. This is hardly surprising given the various scandals that have had negative impacts on the financial sector over the last few years: ENRON, WorldCom, and Parmalat, and the authorities on both sides of the Atlantic have taken actions to remedy perceived flaws in compliance. In the US, Sarbanes-Oxley came out almost overnight, and whilst in the European Union the response was slower and spread out over various parts of the Corporate Governance Action Plan, its total impact was no less wide ranging.



The result is a range of proposals for new rules and regulations that industry has to manage as best it can. One option is to push for a reduction or pause in the development of new rules. This approach appears to have had some success in the European Union, with Commissioner McCreevy stating that consolidation of the new rules is his top priority, and that in future any new rules will only be proposed if the benefits can be demonstrated through a rigorous impact assessment.However, what is already in the pipeline in the European Union, implementation of FMID, IAS/IFRS and CRD, for example, is daunting in itself. Moreover, even if fewer new rules emerge over the next few years the ones that do are likely to continue the trend to higher levels of compliance that are more onerous and costly to meet. The cost of non-compliance, financial sanctions from supervisors and reputational damage, means that failure to keep up with this relentless increase in the compliance burden is not an option for financial firms.



Firms have to meet the compliance challenge, but there are not only costs but also potentially added value to their business. So how can firms ensure they reap the greatest benefits and lowest cost from compliance The difficult task is striking a viable balance between the benefits of improved compliance and the increased costs. The core problem is that the costs are easier to identify than the added value, which is difficult to pin point exactly let alone measure. This is true for industry and the authorities drawing up the compliance rules. Simply meeting the compliance requirements is clearly not enough. Firms have to identify the potential benefits and work to maximize them. They also have to enter into a regular dialogue with European Union legislators and regulators to develop a common understanding on the goals and impact of future regulation.



Epsilon Events and Houston Consulting Europe are organizing a one-day compliance workshop in the Meridian Hotel in Brussels on 19 October. The event will be interactive, with strong audience participation. The objective will be to keep the numbers within limits which optimize a genuine exchange between participants.



This workshop brings together policy-makers and practitioners to review and develop solutions to issues of compliance in the financial sector arising in connection with EU policy, regulation and legislation. It will examine the manageability of the flow of regulation, and alternatives; it will then look at particular examples, in the area of prudential requirements and capital, as well as in securities markets (MFID and Market Abuse), before seeking to draw some specific conclusions.



For registration or further information please visit www.epsilonevents.com or alternatively contact Dan Craft at +44 2920 642 701 or Nickolas Reinhardt at +32 2 504 80 40.

↑ Grab this Headline Animator

---

This article has been robotically scanned and tagged by Prnewsnow with the following search tags. No human manipulation of these tags take place.
| Lammers | ��blanket Blue | release ��blanket blue |

---

4940 readers online...

, Local News