Microsoft is planning to slash operational costs by introducing a new blockchain to manage royalty payments for gaming developers.
Built on top of the Quorum blockchain using Microsoft’s Azure Cloud, it will initially be tested on Microsoft’s Xbox gaming console to manage payments for video game publishers, including Ubisoft, one of the largest gaming publishers worldwide. The company made $1.65 billion in sales last year and produces a cascade of hit franchises such as Assassin’s Creed, Prince of Persia, Just Dance, Rayman, Far Cry and the Tom Clancy series.
The new blockchain could also be used to manage Microsoft’s movie royalties and other verticals that require licensing for intellectual property. Microsoft expects the solution to encompass thousands of royalty partners and process millions of transactions per day to make it one of the world’s largest enterprise blockchain ecosystems.
Microsoft’s current software system for royalty management is reportedly complex, despite what appears as a smooth transaction for the end user making a game purchase. The legacy system juggles thousands of titles, vendors and publishing houses across the globe, reconciling transactions that have to adhere to various jurisdictions and tax codes.
To impact its bottom line, Microsoft and its multinational accounting partner Ernst & Young (EY) are hoping to streamline the royalty payment process and cut operating costs in half by eliminating the costly manual reconciliations and partner reviews that are required to build trust.
“Smart contract technology is far more flexible and scalable than any prior solution for managing business agreements,” says Grace Lao, General Manager of Finance Operations at Microsoft.
But blockchain skeptics often point out that scaling for enterprise solutions has not yet become a reality. Test pilots and visionary applications need to be applied to real-world use cases and solve tangible problems. With Microsoft’s Xbox blockchain initiative, it hopes to prove that the new technology can deliver on processing millions of transactions not only faster than the legacy system but in a much more transparent way.
Blockchain’s automation would allow smart contracts to be executed instantly. Information that’s recorded, validated and automatically verified on a digital ledger would eliminate the traditional verification steps that can slow down royalty payments and require 45 days or longer to process and complete.
“The scale, complexity and volume of digital rights and royalties transactions makes this a perfect application for blockchains,” says Paul Brody, EY Global Innovation Leader. “A blockchain can handle the unique nature of each contract between digital rights owners and licensors can be handled in a scalable, efficient manner with an audit trail for the participants. By deploying this on Microsoft Azure, we believe this will be highly scalable across thousands of royalties and content partners.”
If implemented successfully, blockchain applications for royalty payments would have a huge impact on creatives such as a gaming developers, software developers, audio and video artists, writers, graphic designers, musicians and digital media content creators who would benefit from a transparent system that can track royalties faster and process payments more quickly.
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Recent Banks Collapses reason and Risk ManagementRecent Banks Collapses reason and Risk Management
Introduction
The financial sector is vital for economic activity and providing services to businesses, households and government entities. Thus, financial stability is significant for the broader economy. Recently, a lot of banks have failed due to various factors.
This paper gives an overview of the key factors and enablers of recent bank collapses. It considers approaches to manage risk to stop similar events in the future. Firstly, it explores the main causes of losses at financial institutions over the past decade including external shocks like dropping interest rates and economic downturns; inadequate capital leading to weak governance and management; competition from new entrants into banking; evolving technologies that can threaten traditional business models; and increasing borrowing across households and businesses.
The paper then looks at two approaches to handle risks associated with banking activities: prudential supervision by authorities such as central banks and regulation to attain structural resilience in banking sector activities. It examines proposed initiatives to strengthen supervision efforts like stress testing, macro stress tests and risk assessment methodologies for individual banks, and frameworks to manage systemic risk across borders.
Lastly, it reviews policy actions for improving resilience within banks including focus on corporate governance; stronger internal controls; improved risk management practices including data analytics; advanced cyber security measures; capital adequacy requirements set by central banks or other regulatory authorities & more comprehensive disclosure standards required by regulators.
Causes of Bank Collapses
Bank collapses have been occurring frequently lately. Reasons for this include: bad risk management, economic difficulties, misusing money, and lack of monitoring.
Here, let’s explore the causes of bank collapses and what can be done to stop them in the future.
Poor Risk Management
Risk management is linked to the recent bank collapses. It covers various areas, such as poor corporate governance, inadequate capitalization, and the mismanagement of risks like interest rate, liquidity, and credit risk.
Poor risk management makes it hard for banks to see their exposure to operational, market, and credit risks. If this isn’t managed, liabilities will grow, leading to an inability to meet regulatory capital requirements.
For example, liquidity risk could cause banks to not access necessary funds when they are most needed. Poor liquidity risk management can lead to a collapse.
Risk management also involves policies and procedures to control operational and legal risks, such as fraud prevention, anti-money laundering protocols, and cybersecurity measures. If these aren’t followed, fines can be costly, further weakening the balance sheet.
Poor Governance
Poor governance practices lead to bank collapses. Corporate governance is about relationships between shareholders and management. Weak oversight, if supported by senior management, can lead to bad strategies such as excessive risk-taking. Poor governance brings low transparency and accountability. Inadequate investment in tech systems and consumer databases also puts banks at risk.
Untrained or inexperienced board members, plus small board sizes, make it hard for directors to oversee practices, set goals and assess risks. Low salaries for executive directors reduce the attractiveness of the role and encourage boards to hire unqualified outsiders. This reduces effectiveness, increases costs and affects a firm’s ability to handle crises.
Over-leveraging
Excessive borrowing and lending, known as over-leveraging, has been a major cause of recent bank collapses. Banks try to increase profits and market share by taking on high-risk clients and making riskier loans with worse terms. They might even use their own capital to give more leverage. This can result in huge losses if the borrowers cannot repay due to a recession or financial crisis.
This combination of leveraging accounts and credit extension has caused large losses for many banks, both big and small. It is hard for lenders to get back from these losses and sometimes this leads to them closing down for good or being taken over.
For healthy banking operations, it is important that lenders put a limit on how much they lend out. This helps them reduce their risk and access capital when needed without over-stretching.
Inadequate Capitalization
Capitalization that is insufficient can lead to bankruptcy and insolvency for banks. Regulators determine the capital requirements for banks, and watch that the bank meets them through exams. The regulators’ primary job is to make sure the bank has enough capital to protect depositors and investors from losses due to bad investments or market risks.
When a bank’s assets are more than its liabilities, it is said to be adequately capitalized. But, if the bank has not enough capital to back its operations, it could become insolvent and go bankrupt. There are various reasons why capital may be inadequate. These include investments on the balance sheet that are not properly priced for risk, too much dividend payments which reduce the equity, overstated assets, or wrongly assessing reserve requirements.
To stop inadequate capitalization, banks must follow the required levels of reserves set by law or regulation. There are also other internal strategies, such as using ratios for market risk management. Auditors, working on behalf of FINRA or FDIC, check to make sure banks comply with the regulations, and remain solvent and functioning.
Impact of Bank Collapses
Bank collapses can bring serious economic trouble. These can cause large losses, limit access to credit, and create long-term disruption in the financial sector.
This article will investigate recent bank collapses, the causes, and potential prevention strategies. Risk management is one way to avoid such situations.
Loss of investor confidence
Banks can collapse, even if they are not insured by the FDIC. This can cause fear and doubt in a financial institution or sector. It may happen due to risky investments that overextend resources. One bank failing can set off a chain of other failures.
It is essential for banks to manage risk and have sound financial standing. Else, depositors could suffer losses if the bank fails. Risky activities, like subprime lending, can result in large government bailouts. Unsecured loans backed by lenders who were not properly vetted can also lead to this. Furthermore, internal corruption, fraud, or mismanagement can increase risk factors and the potential for collapse.
Investors may be scared off when banking shares fall due to instability in the market. If they lose faith in their banking partner, they might go elsewhere. To avoid this, banks must keep investor trustworthiness.
Financial instability
A bank collapse can be catastrophic. Generally, financial distress is the main cause. This may include increased bad debts plus accumulation of non-performing assets. As these conditions worsen, liquidity decreases and creditors lose faith in the bank’s ability to pay. Usually, different issues combine to create a bank failure, leaving customers without deposits, and creditors without repayment.
Financial instability is usually due to mismanagement and non-compliance with regulations. Other risk factors include political unrest, cybercrime, natural disasters, devaluation, market volatility, and market competition. To manage these risks, sound control systems should be set up–covering credit risk, liquidity risk, market risk, operational risk, and information management.
Increase in unemployment
Recent years have seen a sharp rise in bank collapses worldwide. This has caused a huge surge in unemployment. Bank failures have devastating economic consequences, and one of the most obvious is unemployment. Those employed directly by banks and those employed by firms that dealt with banks suffer job loss.
Job losses due to bank failures often happen without warning. Employees may not know their jobs are in danger until they are laid off. This means they have no time to prepare. Hundreds or even thousands of people can become unemployed because of one banking collapse. This sudden increase in joblessness reduces spending power, and makes it even harder for those already struggling financially.
The banking industry has taken action to prevent further banking collapses. This includes diversifying investment options and implementing better monitoring systems for firms associated with ‘at-risk’ banks. Governments also need to put laws into place that protect customers from being taken advantage of financially. Better visibility of risks will help to prevent banking collapses, leading to a more stable economy and fewer job losses.
Risk Management Strategies
Financial crisis recently happened, causing many banks to go bankrupt. But, with proper risk management, future losses can be reduced.
This article will explain different risk management strategies, and how they can be used to protect your business or investments.
Risk Identification
Risk identification is the process of figuring out which risks could prevent an organization from reaching their desired goals. Internal factors (like policies, procedures and operations) and external factors (like economic conditions, political developments and legal requirements) should be analyzed and evaluated.
Risks can also be identified from several sources, like customer feedback, market research, industry publications and management studies. After potential risks are identified, they must be analyzed to see how likely they are and how severe their effects would be.
Identifying risk requires understanding the organization’s environment. It is an ongoing process that should be documented. Organizations should work with outside groups (like government agencies) to spot new risks that could harm them if not taken care of quickly. Recent bank failures have showcased weaknesses in risk management, leading to more regulation by authorities.
Risk Evaluation
Risk evaluation is essential for efficient risk management. It involves spotting, studying and keeping track of potential dangers, to decide how much they cost or what effect they have. A thorough risk evaluation takes into account both quantitative and qualitative elements.
Quantitative risk evaluation measures the cost or impact of a risk. This includes estimating the chance that an event occurs, and giving numerical value to any losses it may cause. Qualitative risk evaluation looks at the non-financial effects of the event, such as its effect on customer loyalty or relationships with other businesses.
When doing risk evaluation, it’s important to look at each situation from various perspectives, to get an idea of its reach and possible blind spots. It’s also sensible to include past events when making current plans, so you’re better prepared for similar situations in the future.
Communication is key for successful risk management, since everyone involved needs to know about existing risks and new steps taken to reduce them. For successful management, all key personnel must collaborate, to have a clear understanding of objectives and processes during implementation.
Risk Mitigation
Risk mitigation is decreasing the chances and impact of risks that have been noticed in a risk assessment. It is achieved by putting good plans in place to prevent or minimize harm caused by the risk. Everyone needs to work together for risk mitigation, like executive management, operations staff, research and development staff, IT professionals, internal and external auditors, and legal counsel.
Common risk mitigation strategies are:
-Training & Education: Provide regular training to staff about new risks and regulations. This will make sure they know about potential risks in their area of responsibility.
-Risk Avoidance: Stay away from activities or products that have a high risk. This helps to protect from losses due to market factors or legal problems.
-Risk Transfer: Move some of the risk through insurance or contracts. This stops losses due to unforeseen events.
-Risk Sharing: Find risks that can be shared between business partners. This is great if one partner doesn’t have enough resources to handle the risk alone.
-Data Security Measures: Put in protocols like encryption and multi-factor authentication to save sensitive data from cyber criminals and bad actors.
-Audits & Reviews: Do audits and reviews often. This will help find any problems in processes that could cause higher risk levels.
Conclusion
The causes of recent banking sector collapses are multiple. But, poor risk management, aggressive market positions and extensive off-balance sheet structures, are all common. Risk management must be applied widely and an internal control environment that allows for objective assessment of risk taking is essential. Capital adequacy must also be prudently maintained. A transparent regulatory framework is needed to promote safe banking practices. Many countries have implemented reforms and initiatives to protect the banking system. Nevertheless, vigilance is still necessary to prevent any potential risks.
Lastly, proper oversight and safeguards must exist to ensure the banking system is positioned for long term success.
About Post Author
Mirza Ashraf Beg @ Dubai
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Money Protects have partnered with BII WORLD along with other big companies.Money Protects have partnered with BII WORLD along with other big companies.
BII World is emerging one of the top Event Management Company with many milestone in the region. Best part is that they have engaged the industry during Covid 19 with their state of art abilities to handle submits & conferences virtually and venue based as well. Appreciation and best wishes.
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/activity-6714825962720153600-u_Ri
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Mirza Ashraf Beg @ Dubai
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Banking IntelligenceBanking Intelligence
Customers’ needs have changed in recent years, and traditional brick-and-mortar banking methods just won’t suffice — especially with millennial, who now number over 75 million. But banks and financial institutions are paying attention, and they’re embracing new technologies to compete in this digitized, data-driven, device-using world.By implementing artificial intelligence technology, banks would see costs cut dramatically, along with improved functionality and increased offerings. But that’s only the tip of the iceberg of AI’s benefits to the world of finance. With the ability to find, gather, and analyze large amounts of data instantaneously then decipher those findings with brain-like intelligence, AI can detect points of compromise as soon as they occur, which will help in fraud detection as well as prevent the theft of funds and personal information. Companies like MasterCard and WorldPay have been using AI to detect fraudulent transaction patterns for several years now.
Banks across the world, especially in Europe, have begun replacing older statistical-modeling approaches with artificial intelligence and cognitive computing technology. AI technology can even help with credit risk management by accurately predicting which customers are more likely to cancel service or default on their loans. Its data profiling analysis can determine if someone is of high or low risk by scouring through variables and values of relationships, co-factors, interactions, dependencies, associations, and more. AI even has the potential to pick winning stocks and investments by studying earnings statements, news reports, and regulatory filings in search of clues. With the automation of due diligence, anything is possible.
Digital banking is not an option; rather, it is a must-have strategy essential to surviving in a highly competitive environment. The strong growth in the digital banking has made it imperative for banks to transform their existing operations into an Omni-channel approach.
In other words, provide the same banking experience to customers irrespective of the channel – be it web, mobile or physical branch.
The development of a strategy towards achieving supremacy in digital banking must consider core elements in their entirety to achieve desired goals. The primary element is innovation – the ability of the bank to develop unique ideas to transform it. The next element is automating processes, systems and organizational design in order to provide a superior experience to the bank’s customers. Other facets such as mobility and big data must then aid these elements. Big data allows banks to take informed decisions by leveraging the capabilities of data analytics. Similarly, banks need to leverage mobility tools, web and social media platforms and other connectivity options to build even closer relationships with their customers.
Recent Trends in Banking: All Roads Lead to Digital
There are several trends making a strong impact on the digital banking space. Some of these trends are relatively mature, whereas a few recent developments still have fairly low penetration or usage among banks.
Mobile Banking
In emerging markets such as China and India, the penetration of mobile banking is stronger as compared to developed markets. Most banks today offer mobile banking, ranging from basic mobile applications to more sophisticated apps comprised of unique value added services and features – such as social media integration and augmented reality. Many new mobile-only banks have cropped up across the globe and are threatening the market share of traditional banks.
Social Media
New disruptive technologies are now being used by banks to integrate social media into banking services, ranging from payments, transfers to even utilizing it for calculating credit scores and lending decisions.
Biometrics
Banks are now increasingly using voice biometrics, fingerprint scanning and iris scans as authentication tools to enhance security platforms and address identity theft-related challenges. Biometrics is considered a serious contender to replace passwords in the future.
Cloud
The use of cloud to process banking transactions is expected to attain a 60% global market share by 2016. SAAS and cloud software offer huge advantages in terms of cost and scalability.
Bank CIOs’ can offer an enhanced customer experience by leveraging cloud computing tools and integrating cloud with their digital offerings.
Personal Finance Management
Personal financial management applications have evolved from basic tools to more advanced and automated platforms that leverage big
data, analytics, behavioral research and other technologies to automate and digitize personal financial management. Banks are offering these value-added services to enhance engagement levels with customers.
Contextual Banking
In today’s dynamic and hyper-connected business environment, it has become imperative for banks to o er the right service to the right customer at the right time. Omni-channel banking that provides a consistent banking experience to customers across multiple channels is becoming key to success.
Digital Wallet
Digital wallet is a mature digital banking technology, with strong usage and penetration among customers. Customers frequently use wallets to conduct small transactions across the globe. The market is expected to grow 30% on a CAGR basis in the next 5 years.
P2P Lending & Payments
P2P and other alternative digital lending platforms have garnered attention in the last several years, due to an increased volume of funding and owing to shorter turnaround times in loan disburse, innovative credit appraisal methods and improved lending rates.
Block chain
Block chain, or distributed ledger technology, is expected to transform the entire financial services space – be it back-end banking operations, trade finance and lending, payments or insurance. Banks around the world are either exploring usage of block chain or testing it in their operations.
Wearables
Wearables are being evaluated by banks as a new interaction and authentication medium. With increasing penetration among consumers, wearables are poised to become a mainstream digital banking application.
Disruptions & Innovations – What Does the Future of Banking Look Like?
New innovations and disruptions in the banking and financial services industry make the future look very exciting and technology focused. Block chain is already creating ripples in the banking technology space with a myriad of new applications being explored with the distributed ledger technology. Similarly, the wealth management space is being disrupted by ‘robot advisor’ platforms that are not only automating portfolio management, but also integrating innovative technologies.
Several new innovations are redefining the payment landscape, such as near field communications, biometrics and block chain.
Another notable disruption is branches are being transformed to create true Omni-channel banking experiences with new and innovative digital technologies – ranging from portable bank to video tellers and 100% digital or paperless branches.
Image-based banking that utilizes smart phone cameras to capture deposits, checks or bills is another disruptive technology making waves in the banking industry. Virtual agents, live chats and social media-based support channels are being offered by banks to provide an enhanced service experience to customers.
The internet-of-things, which has revolutionized many industries, is also making its presence felt in the banking space. Machine learning and artificial intelligence are also being explored to enhance the customer experience.
Many banks have set up their own innovation labs to explore new banking applications and disruptive technologies. They are also organizing hackathons and participating with fintech accelerators to explore new disruptive technologies. Banks are collaborating and establishing strategic alliances with fintech companies, as they do not want to
lag behind in the race towards innovation and disruption. Banks are making APIs open to third parties to scale up their ecosystem of strategic partners and speed development of disruptive applications. New banks such as Fidor and Atom have emerged as serious threats to traditional banks and thus it has become imperative for traditional banks to adopt new technologies through strategic alliances with fintech players.
BFSI IT Vendors & Consulting Companies – What Are They Doing to Remain in the Race?
IT companies such as UST Global, Infosys, Accenture and others are focusing strongly on disruptive banking technologies such as AI, machine learning and block chain, and making digital a strong priority across all financial services verticals. Consulting firms
such as McKinsey and Bain are also increasingly focusing on transforming the existing operations of their banking clients towards the digital ecosystem.
IT companies are organizing fintech hackathons and investing in startups that are coming up with novel technologies to disrupt the banking space.
About Post Author
Mirza Ashraf Beg @ Dubai
Outclass expertise in Products & Regulatory Controls, Risk Management, in “Business Modeling” focused on bespoke client products along with technology adoption. Proven in-depth understanding of micro/macro financial market econometrics, Offshore, Cross Border Banking and Legal Barriers.
Major Strengths:
• Debt & Asset Management
• Treasury, Investment & Funds
• Credit Management & Product Development
• Structured products and Restructuring
• Hedging and Derivative Markets
• FinTech & Reg Tech Advisory
Expert in Regional/Global Regulatory operational management having exemplary accolades in Islamic Banking with high end achievements in structured products.
Expertise in Global Intelligence, Value Research, Product Development & Processing, projects related to current global disruptive technological changes & its adaptation through FinTech Landscape – micro/macro.
Author is a Fintech Writer, Market Researcher, Speaker & Panelist in various International Banking & Technology Forums: Terrapin, Clear stream/Euroclear, Fleming, BII, Allan Lloyds, Trescon, Alpha-one, PWC, Finastra Universe - Misys-Connect etc.