Case study on coordination of cybersecurity risk management in the UK insurance sector

There have recently been significant and growing levels of government and regulatory interferenceiaffecting the cybersecurity risk and cyberrisk insurance practices in the UK financial sector. A short case study documents these efforts, based on the interviews conducted with relevant stakeholders, regulator repres entatives and other key gatekeepers as to most relevant areas and highlights efforts by the Bank of England to coordinate the industry’s resilience against cyber attacks

What lies beneath

Lurking under treacherous public spending waters is an iceberg of off-balance sheet costs and other hidden debts. Future generations will have to pick up the tab

A trade-level DEA model to evaluate relative performance of investment fund managers

We develop a trade-level measure to evaluate fund managers’ efficiency in their buying and selling activities relative to the trades of other fund managers. We customize an additive Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) model to focus on risk-adjusted returns during different time periods as trade-level outcomes. The model does not consider any input-output process. Instead, it considers tradeoffs between multiple outcomes. We find that fund managers do not have symmetric ability in buying and selling. Some managers do well in buy transactions but not in sell transactions while others perform well in selling but not in buying. We also explore the determinants of fund managers’ trading performance. Compared to trade characteristics, portfolio characteristics have a greater influence in explaining fund managers’ relative trading efficiency

The impact of the adoption of hedge accounting rules on enterprise risk management adoption practices by multinationals

We predict that adoption of Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) by multinational non-financial firms is inter-related with both firm hedge accounting policies and choices about whether to adopt US GAAP or IFRS('GAAP quality'). We hypothesize that sources of both market risk and idiosyncratic risk mitigate the ability of ERM-adopting firms to produce greater risk reducution. Therefore, we predict that sources of firm specific risk, such as pension risk, and hedge accounting policies, as well as GAAP quality, interact with ERM to affect incentives facing multinational firms to reduce their risk. Consistent with this hypothesis, we find that firms adopting ERM experience a reduction in stock return volatility but only for the period following implementation. Our results also find that income smoothing; GAAP choice and geographical complexity mitigate the effect of ERM adoption on risk and return volatility for ERM-adopting firms

Incentives facing UK-listed companies to comply with the risk reporting provisions of the UK Corporate Governance Code

Recent changes made to the UK Corporate Governance Code require UK firms to report new or enhanced narrative information concerning their principal risks, their risk management processes and their future viability. This paper analyses whether the level and nature of voluntary compliance with these new requirements is consistent with alternative economic and political visibility incentives. We analyse relevant sections of financial reports produced by industry matched samples of large-, mid-and small-cap UK listed firms during the transitional 2013-14 financial reporting years. Both specific and generic readability attributes of the reports are measured. We find that virtually no firm in our sample has provided any viability statement. Empirical analysis of disclosures concerning principal risk assessment and review processes appear to be primarily motivated by political visibility reasons. Examples of particularly good and cases of poor corporate risk reporting practices are also discussed. Possible implications for the actuarial profession are discussed

Competition among accounting standard setters: a property rights analysis

This paper develops a property rights analysis of competion among accounting standard setters. The takings decision is costly as it imposes some form of compensation to be paid to a national accounting standard setter whose property rights to issue accounting standards are taken away and conferred instead on a competing standard setting body, the IASC. Applying a scenario developed by Giammarino and Nosal (1994), a political-game play model is presented which assumes four participants: (a) IOSCO; (b) a national-based regulatory authority; and (c) a national-based accounting standard setting body and the IASC who compete for the right to set international-GAAP. The optimal linear compensation rule for the takings decision is found to depend upon with which interest group the regulatory authority s preferences coincide

Determinants of the use of financial reporting standards by Australian pension plans

Previous empirical research demonstrates that the voluntary disclosure of defined benefit pension plan (DBPP) information by employers is value-relevant to investors and carries potential proprietary costs. This paper extends these findings in the context of the voluntary use of financial reporting standards (FRS) in annual reports sent by pension plans to their participants. FRS use is predicted to be related to proprietary costs for defined benefit pension plans (DBPPs) and to political visibility for defined contribution pension plans (DCPPs). Tests on the voluntary reporting practices of samples of 54 Australian DCPPs and 54 DBPPs during 1991-92 support these prediction

Competition among pressure groups for political influence over the determination of accounting standards

This paper integrates prior studies of accounting policy choice and lobbying activities by testing the empirical implications of Becker''s (1983) theory of competition among pressure groups for political influence over the determination of accounting standards. The theory is applied to explain the nature and outcome of conflict among pressure groups representing financial intermediaries (suppliers) and pension fund members (users) over the development of conflicting Australian pension accounting rules in 1991-92. Various pension fund financial characteristics and management incentives (including discretionary accounting policy choice and voluntary financial disclosures in pension plan financial reports) are posited to affect the pressure functions of each group. These functions combine to affect a political influence function that determines the rule development process. Consistent with the predicted relationships, it is found that supplier groups exert the most political pressure and secure political influence over the development of rules affecting defined benefit pension plans, whereas no group influences the development of rules affecting defined contribution pension plans