As the United Kingdom gets ever closer to withdrawing from the European Union, no small amount of economic turmoil and compliance headaches are sure to follow. For compliance officers at companies doing business in Europe and the United Kingdom, the possibility of a Brexit provides the sort of job security nobody is keen on having. Paul Hodgson reports.
Paul Hodgson
Posted inEurope
How to stop banks from behaving like banks
In the never-ending quest to address the systemic risk posed by the banking industry, a team of academics and the Banking Standards Board have raised fresh initiatives to improve banking regulation itself. But are a globally imposed “risk tax” and a push to improve banking culture really what banks need?
Posted inFrom the Archive
EU non-financial reporting: directives and consultations
The Non-Financial Reporting Directive requiring all member states to adopt legislation for public company non-financial reporting comes into force on 6 December 2014, giving EU member states two years to transpose it into national law. According to a European Commission impact assessment, those companies have a lot of work to do, as just 2,500 large EU companies currently publish some kind of non-financial report on their business, with 94 percent still to jump into the game.
Posted inBoards & Shareholders
Women on U.K. boards: A (partial) success story
Corporate boards across the United Kingdom continue to have low numbers of women on them, suggesting that the struggle to increase board diversity is going slower than planned. But progress is indeed being made, all while raising the difficult questions as to why it is not so easy to build a more diverse board, and what organizations can expect—aside from greater compliance with diversity quotas—once its leadership better represents women.
Posted inEurope
Gender pay gap reporting in the United Kingdom
The draft regulations on reporting statistics outlining the potential gender pay gap at U.K. companies were published in early February this year, and reactions to the regulations have on the whole been positive, says Jillian Naylor, employment partner at U.K. law firm Linklaters. Inside, CW’s Paul Hodgson provides an in-depth look at the proposed requirements and the effect they’ll have on EU firms.
Posted inEurope
Under Single Resolution Mechanism, EU banks get bail-in
The European Union’s Single Resolution Mechanism (SRM), part of a larger post-financial crisis initiative known as the Bank Recovery and Resolution Drive (BRRD), has recently received further implementation. The advancement of SRM means that banks must have recovery plans, but EU-level authorities can intervene if they sense a bank is failing, a.k.a., do a “bail-in.” The step is just one of many under the BRRD, which is meant to ensure the stability of financial institutions and banks.