AlacraBlog

Risk-based Approach - Regulatory Highlights

“Risk-based approach” is a phrase used in many domains, from pharmaceutical manufacturing practices to auditing, to testing internal controls, to combating money laundering and terrorist financing. The AML regulations are consistent in saying a risk-based approach should be deployed; our best practices that follow explain how some financial institutions get this done.

BSA (Bank Secrecy Act): In a report regarding BSA, Gibson Dunn states, “Under the BSA and its implementing regulations, and, with respect to banks, parallel requirements of the Federal bank regulators, banks, securities broker-dealers, and certain other "financial institutions" are required to implement risk-based anti-money laundering ("AML") programs to prevent and detect money laundering and terrorist financing and to comply with a labyrinth of BSA/AML laws, regulations, and regulatory guidance.”

FCPA (Foreign Corrupt Practices Act): “We recommend companies follow a risk-based approach: focus on the nature of relationships with their distributors. Determine which distributors are the most likely to qualify as agents, for whose acts the company can be held responsible. Once a company segregates the high-risk distributors that likely qualify as agents and potentially subject the company to FCPA liability from mere resellers that pose little FCPA risk, FCPA compliance procedures can be tailored appropriately. Distributors that qualify as ‘‘agents’’ and also pose FCPA risk, full FCPA due diligence, certifications, training, and contract language are imperative,” according to the FCPA Professor.

FSA (Financial Services Authority, UK): The FSA states, “Firms must put in place adequate and risk-sensitive AML policies and procedures. This means that firms have to identify and assess their money laundering risk and put in place systems and controls adequately to manage and mitigate this risk. Firms who apply a risk-based approach to AML will focus AML resources where they will have the biggest impact. The risk-based approach means a focus on outputs. Firms must have in place policies and procedures in relation to customer due diligence and monitoring, among others, but neither the law nor our rules prescribe in detail how firms have to do this. Firms’ practices will vary depending on the nature of the money-laundering risks they face and the type of products they sell.”

For more, download Alacra’s Best Practices in KYC for Financial institutions whitepaper.

Customer Identification Best Practices

In Stephen Covey's "The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People," Habit Two is "Begin with the end in mind." Customer Identification is the start of the KYC process. Basically, a thorough customer identification procedure can set the stage for best practices throughout the entire onboarding process. One variable is how much data is the front desk or the relationship manager responsible for acquiring? Weaker firms in terms of process required only the customer's name. Stronger, process oriented firms had relationship managers getting address and other basic dBSocumentation from the customer, which was then verified by the due diligence team.

Our experience with "how customer identification is achieved" varies widely from firm to firm and occasionally from department to department. In some cases customer identification is handled with aplomb by the relationship managers dealing with the customer, in other cases customer identification responsibilities are delegated to the customer due diligence team. When customer identification is given to the Customer Due Diligence (CDD) team, the method of communication between the relationship manager and the CDD team is where a best practice can most effectively be deployed.

We found three ways this communication is completed:

• Unstructured—essentially no process.
• Structured—through a request form or email that is used consistently.
• System-to-system—electronic communication from a relationship management system to a KYC/onboarding system.

As a general rule, financial institutions with unsystematic data entry mechanisms also had an overall poor KYC process. Therefore, a crucial "best practice" recommendation is to start the process in a robust manner. Without a clean and precise data entry process, it is practically impossible for a financial company to create an accurate onboarding audit trail (which will be discussed later in greater detail). Another potential risk is that the on-boarding process from initiation to completion includes many expensive, manual processes that can take days or weeks to finalize.

Often, an unsystematic process requires scanning or re-keying information into multiple internal and external back-office systems, which increases the risk of inaccuracies and spelling mistakes. To address these issues, companies should invest in an electronic data system that enables staff to key information once and then have duplicate data auto-populated into other areas of the same form or into other forms.

This will become even more critical as regulations such as FATCA become effective as the customer identification process becomes more complex, with various indicia being required to determine if the client falls under the FATCA regime. There are likely to be regulations that are similar to FATCA in other jurisdictions in coming years.

Regulatory Highlights in KYC

The CDD area is where Alacra has the most experience so we have taken a more detailed look at the CDD process by breaking it up into three sections: risk-based approach; sanctions lists, PEPs and database checks; and beneficial ownership. Directly below are excerpts that reveal the vagueness of regulatory instructions for CDD and KYC; we will have other more specific regulatory examples in the sections that follow.

FFIEC/BSA (Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council/Bank Secrecy Act): As stated in CDD Overview of the  BSA Manual, "the objective of CDD should be to enable the bank to predict with relative certainty the types of transactions in which a customer is likely to engage. These processes assist the bank in determining when transactions are potentially suspicious. The concept of CDD begins with verifying the customer’s identity and assessing the risks associated with that customer. Processes should also include enhanced CDD for higher-risk customers and ongoing due diligence of the customer base."

FSA (Financial Services Authority, UK): The UK Financial Services Authority Discussion Paper 22: Reducing Money Laundering Risk; August 2003 states, "although there are no specific legal or regulatory KYC (as opposed to simple identification) requirements, high-level obligations in the Money Laundering Regulations and the FSA Handbook require a firm to counter the risk of money laundering,"

FATF (Financial Action Task Force): "Financial institutions should be required to undertake customer due diligence when:

a)       Establishing business relations

b)       Carrying out occasional transactions over a designated threshold

c)       There is a suspicion of money laundering or terrorist financing

d)       The financial institution has doubts about the veracity or adequacy of previously obtained customer data.

CCD includes identifying and verifying the customer's identity; identifying the beneficial owner; understanding the business relationship; conducting ongoing due diligence on the business relationship,” according to FATF Recommendations.

Best Practices in Customer Identification

While only the language from the FSA says, "there are no specific legal or regulatory KYC requirements," the truth is that there are few KYC process mandates in any of the jurisdictions in which Alacra has clients. This has led to a wide range of practices across firms and across department within firms. Whereas the stronger firms have robust practices in place for each of the next remaining sections of this paper, we’ve seen weak customer identification followed by a handful of Google searches and some paper files constituting an entire KYC effort.

Here are a few overall best practices before we get into more specific customer due diligence areas. These might seem obvious, but a surprising number of financial institutions do not have these practices in place.

1. Anywhere you can create a process you should create a process. In a regulatory audit, having onboarding professionals conducting due diligence in a consistent fashion will indicate the organization takes KYC seriously and has trained employees on how to do their jobs effectively.

2. Have an audit trail for each investigation. This will prove that the onboarding process was adhered to for each and every investigation and that there was no material adverse data as of the investigation date.

3. Have a "do not do business with" database. This will eliminate unnecessary work and indicate to regulators that you’re keeping track of bad guys.

4. Have a database of entities that have been successfully onboarded. This can save significant amount of resource when an existing, already vetted customer wants to do more or different business with your institution. This can also help define your refresh schedule and reduce the number of times you need to go back to the customer for more information.

5. Don’t fall behind on your refresh schedule.

For more, download Alacra’s Best Practices in KYC for Financial institutions whitepaper.

Best Practices in KYC for Financial Institutions

This is the first in a series on best practices for Know Your Customer workflows.

Alacra has been delivering Compliance Workflow solutions to financial institutions since 2005. Our sales and implementation process usually involves many client meetings. As we work out the configuration with the client, the question we are often asked is, “What are other banks doing to solve these challenges?"

That's a tough question for us to answer for three reasons. First, we have confidentiality and non-disclosure agreements in place with all our clients so we can't say anything about a specific firm. Second, our clients are spread out geographically and are therefore subject to different regulatory regimes. That influences what they do and how they do it. Third, processes and procedures for KYC vary widely not only from bank to bank but within different departments in a single bank.

To help answer the question, "What are other banks doing?" we put together this helpful series, which ties together various regulations with best practices in three key areas of the Know-Your-Customer process. The three areas we focus on are:

1. Customer Identification

2. Customer Due Diligence   

    a. Risk-based Approach

    b. Sanctions Lists, PEPs and Database Checks

    c. Beneficial Ownership

3. Ongoing Monitoring

We have reviewed much of the relevant regulation from both government regulators and industry trade groups and have highlighted key segments of the regulations at the beginning of each section. Our focus has been on regulations related specifically to anti-money laundering (AML) and KYC, and we also included information on FCPA, UK Anti-Bribery, and FATCA, as there is an important KYC component to each. We then describe what we believe are the best practices in each area based on our work with our clients and prospects.

While I talk about the KYC process, we have found that firms that focus on improving each part of the process usually exhibit more of the best practices we have described herein and that these firms were much less likely to experience difficult regulatory audits.

Customer Identification–Regulatory Agency Overview

Every regulatory framework that oversees a financial institution interacting with a customer emphasizes customer identification as a critical first-step in anti-money laundering compliance.

FinCEN (Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, US Department of Treasury): In the United States, FinCEN regulates the customer identification procedures (a.k.a. "know your customer rules") at banks. A bank’s CIP must include risk-based procedures for verifying the identity of each customer to the extent reasonable and practicable. It is critical that each bank develop procedures to account for all relevant risks including those presented by the types of accounts maintained by the bank, the various methods of opening accounts provided, the type of identifying information available, and the bank’s size, location, and type of business or customer base. Thus, specific minimum requirements in the rule, such as the four basic types of information to be obtained from each customer, should be supplemented by risk-based verification procedures, where appropriate, to ensure that the bank has a reasonable belief that it knows each customer’s identity.

According to FinCen's documentation, the Agencies note that the CIP, while important, is only one part of a bank’s BSA/AML compliance program. Adequate implementation of a CIP, standing alone, will not be sufficient to meet a bank’s other obligations under the BSA, regulations promulgated by its primary Federal regulator, such as Suspicious Activity Reporting requirements, or regulations promulgated by the Office of Foreign Assets Control.

JMLSG (Joint Money Laundering Steering Group): Their report, Prevention of money laundering/combating terroristfinancing - GUIDANCE FOR THE UK FINANCIAL SECTOR PART I states, “the firm identifies the customer by obtaining a range of information about him. The verification of the identity consists of the firm verifying some of the information against documents, data or information obtained from a reliable and independent source."

FATCA (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, US Department of Treasury, Internal Revenue Service): "Requires a financial institution to report indicia of US status: US citizenship or lawful permanent resident (green card) status; a US birthplace; a US residence address or a US correspondence address; standing instructions to transfer funds to an account maintained in the US; an "in care of" address or a "hold mail" address that is the sole address with respect to the customer; a power of attorney or signatory authority granted to a person with a US address."

It’s about the process

We cannot emphasize enough the importance of process. There is a clear correlation between firms that are focused on process and those following "best practices." I always advise clients to “begin with the end in mind.” The start of the process is critical to the entire endeavor and the start of the process is communication between the sales team and relationship managers and the KYC team. The more information gathered from the customer up front and the more clearly this information is communicated to the due diligence professionals, the more effective the onboarding team will be.

Firms display a wide range of techniques when conducting the actual due diligence. Individual investigators conduct KYC research using different databases and different levels of care. "Best practice" firms train their investigators to use consistent processes that are more rigorous than other firms. While all firms are conscious of cost and time spent on each investigation, those that deployed more rules, checklists, and structure to the process are more cost-effective.

The firms that exhibit the most "best practices" try to anticipate what a regulator would look for during an audit. They are concerned about audit trails for their investigations and having well-organized documentary evidence of their decisions to accept new customers.

For more, download Alacra’s Best Practices in KYC for Financial institutions whitepaper.

FATCA Workshop Allows Compliance Professionals to Share Proposed Workflow charts

At Alacra, we understand the difficult workflow decisions financial firms are facing with multiple jurisdictions, reporting requirements, and KYC initiatives. We work closely with our clients and the industry to help everyone make compliance robust and simpler. As such, we recently brought together several clients for our second FATCA Workshop Evening on February 12. The Workshop attendees included representatives of nine major global banks, including RBC, who graciously hosted the event at their offices.

The aim of Alacra's FATCA Workshop is to bring compliance peers together to informally discuss their approaches to, and concerns with, implementing this new and challenging directive. All conversations are kept confidential.

The format is informal with small group discussion on far ranging topics from FATCA to football. The FATCA discussion became lively as one participant distributed a top level FATCA Flow Diagram, sparking several discussions across a range of related topics, including what sits in KYC and what sits within Tax; where in the process the W8 and W9 is collected; when should the FATCA classification be confirmed; and USA branches vs. IGA and withholding.

For FATCA flow diagram samples, see some from around the web: here, here, here, and here.

The next event will be held in London in April 2013. Anyone interested in FATCA and a frank exchange with peers is welcome - please contact us at events [at] alacra.com or contact your Alacra Account Representative to be added to the registration list.

Jim Cramer: It’s The Year of the Deal. People Just Don’t Recognize It.

Earlier this year I posted 10 Forecasts for M&A Activity.  Like the past few years, most people willing to forecast thought the outlook for an increase in M&A activity was excellent and gave the same list of reasons:

1)      Huge cash piles on acquirers’ balance sheets.

2)      Low interest rates which can only move higher.

3)      Slow but improving economy.

4)      Increasing number of opportunities in emerging markets.

One week does not make a boom but there were a lot of encouraging headlines the past few days:

Jim Cramer of The Street: The Year of the Deal Marches Forth – “It's the year of the deal. People just don't recognize it. Stocks have done nothing for years. The good ones have done nothing. The bad ones have done nothing. A handful of stocks stole the spotlight, and the rest have been dogs.”  The M&A market is ready to explode…

NY Times DealBook: Confidence on Upswing, Mergers Make Comeback

Wall Street Journal: Shopping Spree for Wall Street

Huffington Post: Heinz, American Airlines Deals Show Dead Merger Market Coming Back To Life

Time: Mergers and Acquisitions Boom! Is This a Good Sign for the Economy?

After 5 slow years, we’re hoping this week’s consensus is on the mark.

Reference Data - Who Regulates Whom

Many large financial institutions use the regulatory status of a client or counterparty to help determine its risk level and therefore the amount of due diligence required to onboard that entity. The risk level is also used to determine how often that entity must be refreshed from a KYC perspective. An entity that is regulated by an approved regulator is typically classified as low risk and needs to be refreshed less frequently than an unregulated entity. Most banks maintain a list of “approved regulators” that they have constructed based upon the perceived legitimacy and location of the various regulatory bodies. 

Alacra recently surveyed several of our banking clients who helped us compile a list of approved bank regulators, some of these can be seen below with the number of entities they regulate.

 

click to enlarge images

The number of regulatory agencies and the number of regulated entities is very large, making it difficult to monitor status changes and cross-reference information across borders. While an entity’s regulatory status changes infrequently, a change from regulated to unregulated status is a red flag to compliance and reference data professionals alike. From a compliance perspective, an entity that was once classified as low-risk is now probably medium or high risk and should be re-vetted. From a reference data perspective, a change in regulatory status could be the result of a corporate event that should be noted in a firm’s reference database.

Alacra actively tracks each of G20 banking regulators including those listed above using one of several different techniques. Some regulators such as the SEC and the FSA provide feeds that we read. Others, such as FINRA and the NFA send out CDs on a monthly basis. BaFIN and the Bank of Italy each post a spreadsheet; the Japan Financial Services Agency posts a PDF that we need to parse and compare from one edition to the next. Alacra’s proprietary technology takes data from all of these regulatory sites and organizes it in a meaningful, easily searchable way to help speed KYC and other compliance workflows.

In cases where the regulator has assigned a unique identifier to each entity, Alacra picks up this data as well and then maps it to all the other entity identifiers available in the Alacra Authority File. This process includes rating agency issuer identifiers, ISIN, SEDOL, DUNs, exchange ticker, Markit Red Code, and many others.
 
Below is a sample of some recent “Stop Regulation” events as seen in Alacra’s Counterparty Intelligence Application.



Alacra clients use this data to trigger a refresh of a client or counterparty’s KYC information and to alert relationship managers that the regulatory status of their client has changed.

 

Sign up for The Alacra Reference Data Alert, a monthly publication designed to educate the market on how frequently reference data changes and the impact these changes can have on a firm’s reference data repository and their overall KYC/compliance process.

Content Provider Profile: Canadean

Canadean, the powerful consumer market database, is a new Alacra partner. Mr. Tim Royston-Webb, Canadean's Managing Director, recently spent some time telling us about Canadean, the heavy demand for their content and how they helped IKEA understand their gap in the kitchen market.

Tell us about Canadean.

Canadean has long held a reputation with FMCG companies for providing specialist business information by conducting detailed industry and consumer research, supported by insightful value-added analysis. We provide business intelligence covering the entire consumer value chain in the 9 following sectors: Ingredients, Packaging, Beer, Soft Drinks, Wines & Spirits, Health & Beauty, Food, Retail and Foodservice. Our contacts, coupled with our industry leading methodology enables us to provide the most accurate research in the market place.

What are some typical uses for Canadean content?

Our premium reports are often purchased by decision makers at Global Fortune 500 companies in order to improve their marketing, procurement and growth strategies. Typical customers include:

• C level and D Level Management
• Marketing Directors, CEO, Board – (Consumer trends reports in particular)
• Brand managers, Marketing managers, Export Directors, Analysts
  

What makes your content unique?

• Canadean’s unique selling point is our huge survey capability.  With 120,000 consumers surveyed it gives us a real in-depth view on consumer drivers and allows us to quantify trends – no other research house has successfully achieved this before.
• Canadean has been providing strategic analysis to the leading players for nearly 40 years.  Our intelligence has helped shape the market and our reliability has allowed special relationships to form with the likes of coca-cola and PepsiCo who regularly rely on our market sizing data year after year.
• Canadean is an integral part of the industry we work in and have the most comprehensive network of contacts. Our contacts, coupled with our industry leading methodology enables us to provide the most accurate research in the market place.

What do customers like best about Canadean?

• Canadean publications quantify trends as well as supply and demand. 
• We have built up a reputation of trust and knowledgeable insight.
• All our Analysts are specialists in their fields and have years of experience working with international business.
• We have a vast product offering with research from as little as $75 - $10,000+

What business trends are you spotting among your customers?

Unsurprisingly, we’re seeing heavy demand for research on the consumer markets in the BRIC countries as these economies continue to grow at much higher rates than the traditional OECD countries. Competition in BRIC is extremely fierce meaning retailers in particular have to use research as a tool for leverage when entering new markets.

How has the recent economic crisis impacted your market?

The economic crisis has had a minimal effect on sales of Canadean research. Canadean’s focus on food and beverages means it has been well shielded from the global economic downturn, as this industry has not seen a fall in consumption levels – everybody needs to eat after all! 

The current economic environment can be rough for publishers but also provides opportunities. How is the economy impacting your market today?

The consumer market is a very affluent market and is resilient in the face economic difficulty as people will always need to consume.  Therefore manufacturers, suppliers, producers and channels need to understand peoples’ consumption habits and trends behind this, making market research a fundamental requirement for their business needs.

 What sorts of interesting or unexpected uses of your content have you seen?

Canadean helped IKEA to create their latest advertising campaign by understanding where their gap in the kitchens market was, why it was there and how to address it. The results Canadean provided to IKEA led to this shift in positioning and finally a growth of 0.8% in the kitchens market in the UK, the fastest growing against all their peers.

**************

To see recent research from Canadean, visit the Canadean Company Reports on AlacraStore.com. 

If you are interested in contributing your content to The Alacra Store(www.alacrastore.com), please contact Steve Davison at steven[dot]davison[at]alacra[dot]com.

 

Moody’s Fourth Annual Tuition Survey

The Alacra Store is an extreme long-tail ecommerce business.  There are close to 100 million business information SKUs – research reports, earnings call transcripts, credit reports, news stories – from about 50 publishers available on the Store.  Only rarely does a single report sell more than a dozen times; when it does it’s usually a credit research report or an earnings call transcript being purchased by attorneys for a securities litigation case.  So when an expensive piece of content sells several times in the course of a couple of days, we take a look to see what it is.

This week Moody’s released a report titled More US Colleges Face Stagnating Enrollment and Tuition Revenue, which has been purchased several times on the Alacra Store.  At $550, it’s not inexpensive.  This is the abstract:

The cumulative effects of years of depressed family income and net worth, as well as uncertain job prospects for many recent graduates, are combining to soften student market demand at current tuition prices. In addition to these economic challenges, tougher governmental scrutiny of higher education costs and disclosure practices is adding regulatory and political pressure that hinders tuition and revenue from rising at past rates. Federal budget negotiations may result in further pressure on colleges if student aid and loan programs are curtailed to any degree, as a rising share of students are dependent on these funding sources.

I can’t give too much of the report away but here are three highlights:

1)  Enrollment declined in 2012 at nearly half the responding universities.

2)  For FY 2013, many universities are projecting either net tuition revenue declines or revenue increases that will not keep up with inflation.

3)  Online course enrollment is beginning to alter the business model of US higher education.

Although the report is written for bondholders, it’s a great look into what’s affecting higher education.

10 Forecasts for 2013 M&A Activity

Robust M&A activity can help a lot of businesses in New York and Alacra is one of them.  So, at the beginning of every year I make a habit of reading a bunch of projections for the coming year.  The past few years have been slow; the forecast for 2013 is mixed.  One would think there would be more optimism with rates low and corporations having plenty of cash available.  But that’s been the atmosphere since 2009 and the market has been listless.  Let’s hope for a better 2013.

1)  PwC Says Fundamentals are Strong for U.S. Mergers & Acquisitions Activity in 2013

“The fundamentals for sustained M&A activity in 2013 are solid, with improving corporate confidence, increasing private equity activity from both a buy and sell side perspective, and relatively healthy debt markets.  There remains strong competition for quality assets as both corporates and private equity continue to seek out deals to fuel their growth and deploy capital,” said Martyn Curragh, PwC's U.S. Deals Leader.

2)  mergermarket Market Spotlight: 2013 M&A Outlook (PDF)

Many mergers and acquisitions (M&A) practitioners searching for deals in the past year were often left waiting for market conditions to improve.  Through the first three quarters, 2012 set pace to drop 18% in global deal value and 9% in volume compared to the previous year, according to mergermarket research.  According to the respondents of our December survey on 2013 M&A outlook, these numbers should rebound behind the strength of strategic buyers, the emerging markets, and the energy sector.

3) RBS Citizens Middle Market M&A Outlook 2013 (PDF)

As you will see form the report itself, a unique set of factors has coalesced to form a “perfect storm” of M&A activity; a slow yet improving economy, historically low interest rates, and a strong appetite among many businesses for growth through acquisitions.  Along with this heightened activity comes both opportunities and challenges, more competition for quality acquisitions, the risk of cutting corners in due-diligence, and real choices about whether to “buy it” or build it.”

4)  PEDaily.CN: M&A Outlook 2013: Economic Recovery Spurs M&A Activity (China)

Under such stimulus of the accelerated growth of China’s economy in 2013, Chinese [domestic] M&A market is expected to make a new breakthrough and create a new record. …China’s economy is full of growth power after the short-term downturn, adding the loose monetary policy and excellent internal environment; under the circumstances of both excellent internal and external environments, Chinese enterprises will accelerate the pace of their outbound investment strategies and be expected to create a new high in outbound M&As in 2013.

5)  Media M&A in 2013: What's at stake, what's for sale and who's buying?

Get your cheque book out, the boom times are back. OK, perhaps not, but right now is one of the most fertile times to be in the media mergers and acquisitions markets - with some very big brands up for grabs in 2013. Plus, M&A activity is back to pre-recession levels in the media and entertainment space - a broad category that encompasses TheMediaBriefing's core audience of professional media brands, according to media investment bank Jordan Edmiston Group Inc's annual rundown of M&A.

6)  Tech buyers pull in their M&A plans for 2013

Even as 2012 is shaping up to be a lackluster year for tech M&A, next year could be even quieter. In 451 Research’s annual survey of corporate development executives, these buyers dramatically pulled in their acquisition plans for 2013. Just 38% of corporate shoppers said they would be increasing their M&A activity in the coming year – the lowest forecasted activity level in the six years of our survey.

7)  Muted 2012 dampens M&A revival hopes in US

Conditions looked ripe for strong growth in US mergers and acquisitions volumes 12 months ago: the economy was growing, credit markets were open and private equity firms and companies had cash to spend. But a dealmaking boom failed to materialise, however, and few now expect 2013 to be much better.

8)  Video: Mergers & Acquisitions Will Explode in 2013

An explosion of mergers and acquisitions is predicted in 2013 by Robert Profusek, Chairman of the global M&A practice at Jones Day.  It’s a pessimistic time and actually that is a cause for optimism in the merger market.  The basic conditions for M&A have been really fabulous for the last 18 months.  But the market’s just been OK.  It hasn’t been terrible, but it’s hasn’t been good.  And I think it has been held back by all of the negativism that last year was primarily focused on the EU and this year it has been the attending to the fiscal cliff, the election and everything else.  But the conditions are there.  We need more M&A in this country. 

9)  More Mergers on the Horizon?

Even as the volume of regulatory-assisted acquisition deals declines, acquiring banks will soon enjoy new opportunities to expand by acquiring healthy banks.

10)  M&A activity expected to see sharp jump in 2013: E&Y (India)

Mumbai: Although global uncertainties and domestic factors impacted mergers and acquisitions (M&As) in India in 2012, they are expected to see a sharp jump in 2013, to be driven mainly by cross-border activity, global consultancy firm Ernst & Young has said. "Deal activity declined by 8.1 percent as global uncertainties and domestic factors left an impact on Indian M&A in 2012. However, the momentum temporarily picked up in 3Q12 and expected to continue in 2013," Ernst & Young said in its report on M&A here.

How Alacra does an apocalypse

What does Alacra do when faced with an apocalypse and our own impending doom? We throw one heck of a holiday party!

Last night, Alacra celebrated the end of the world at our annual holiday party and as you can see from these photos, a great time was had by all.  As I’m quite frequently known to say, it’s a great thing to go to work every day with some of the best people you know.  And I’d like to give a shout out to Don Roll, our European Managing Director, for wearing his winning Christmas “jumper” and making my night. ~Carol Ann, Marketing Mgr.

Happy Holidays from all your friends at Alacra!!!