Industry roundup: 15 April 2020
by Ben Poole
Pega launches small business lending reference app
Pegasystems has announced the launch of a Crisis Small Business Lending reference application which helps financial institutions manage the thousands of emergency loan applications pouring in from small businesses seeking COVID-19 financial relief. Available to Pega Platform clients and configurable in just days, it comes with prebuilt templates reflecting new US and UK crisis loan guidelines and can be customised to orchestrate crisis loan programmes for other countries.
IOSCO steps up efforts to address sustainability and climate change issues
The Board of the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) has published its report on Sustainable Finance and the Role of Securities Regulators and IOSCO, which seeks to help market participants address issues related to sustainability and climate change. The report highlights three recurring themes that involve multiple and diverse sustainability frameworks and standards, including sustainability-related disclosure, a lack of common definitions of sustainable activities, and greenwashing and other challenges to investor protection.
The report indicates that many issuers and asset managers operating cross border may be subject to different regulatory regimes or participate in multiple regional or international third-party initiatives. This wide variety of regulatory regimes and initiatives, often with inconsistent objectives and requirements, may prevent stakeholders from fully understanding the risks and opportunities that sustainable business activities entail.
EPA offers guidance on digital identification and authentication
The Emerging Payments Association (EPA) has published guidance on digital identification and authentication to help combat financial crime. Due to the increased threat of criminal activity, including fraud, money laundering and financing terrorism, The EPA’s Guidebook to Digital Identification and Authentication calls for robust identification and authentication processes to be employed in the financial services industry.
Supported by Refinitiv, it details the component parts of identification and authentication processes, as well as the current solutions and technologies to consider when trying to meet regulatory requirements. The FCA, in its letter to CEOs, recognises the need for alternative verification methods to obtain the evidence required to meet Money Laundering Regulations. However, to ensure evidence such as ‘selfies’ and ‘scanned documents’ are genuine requires great care. Fortunately, as the guide describes, there are technological solutions which have the controls in place to mitigate the risks of fraudulent evidence.
Kyckr and Citi Commercial Bank agreement
Kyckr has announced the extension of its services to long standing customer Citigroup, to now also include Citi Commercial Bank. As part of the extension of services, Citi Commercial Bank is adopting Kyckr’s customer verification platform. Citi Commercial Bank will use Kyckr’s API solution to access real time primary source data and documents during the critical stage of customer verification when bringing a new business customer onboard.
The value of the services will be in the region of up to US$300,000 (A$496,000), over a 12 to 18 month period, with Kyckr’s technology to be used in 15 countries where the bank operates. Data traffic has commenced and Kyckr remains positive on further developing its relationship with Citigroup. Kyckr currently also supplies Citi’s Institutional Clients Group (ICG) and Trade and Transaction Services (TTS) with API and portal solutions, providing primary source corporate data primarily in customer onboarding globally.
Like this item? Get our Weekly Update newsletter. Subscribe today