How a Leading European Private and Corporate Bank Cleared a 150-Counterparty Review Backlog in 6 Months and Saved €1m a year

Challenge

The merger triggered new compliance requirements that had to be addressed promptly. To align with the parent group's stricter, standardized risk framework, the bank had exactly six months to conduct deep-dive credit assessments on more than 150 financial institution counterparties across 50 countries. The stakes were high: failure could have had implications for the group's regulatory capital under European Central Bank and Basel III/IV frameworks. Doing this internally meant setting up a brand-new credit risk function from scratch; hiring specialized analysts, subscribing to fragmented data sources, and building credit risk models while the clock ran out. The senior management team was facing a logistical dilemma that threatened to derail their focus on customer-centricity and sustainability.

Solutions

S&P Global Market Intelligence provided an end-to-end solution. Within 30 days of signing, a dedicated team of five experienced credit analysts and a project manager were fully deployed.

Leveraging industry-standard Credit Assessment Scorecards integrated with Capital IQ Financials, the team from S&P Global Market Intelligence applied a robust credit assessment framework that included sovereign and / or group support / intervention overlays. With the rich data-sets available and easy-to-deploy scorecard solution, The integration and delivery were seamless. Instead of waiting months for an internal team to ramp up, the bank began receiving 6 to 8 comprehensive analysis reports every week. Monthly progress meetings and rapid-response query resolutions ensured the bank's risk leaders were always informed and in control.

Outcome

By engaging S&P Global Market Intelligence, the bank reduced its operational burden and achieved measurable efficiencies that contributed to a quantifiable return on investment in a short time frame.

Quantitative:

• €1,000,000 in estimated cost saving compared to hiring and training financial institution credit analysts, and licensing new data platforms.
• 3 months to clear the entire high-priority counterparty backlog.
• 150 complex reviews completed in line with the bank’s internal quality standards on time within the strict 6-month deadline.

Qualitative:

• Strategic Shift: With routine responsibilities alleviated, senior management at the bank concentrated their efforts on completing missing information and cultivating high-value relationships with their financial institution counterparties.
• Team Morale: By shifting hours spent on tedious spreadsheets and annual reports to meaningful analysis, the bank’s risk teams can better support goals that advance customer-centricity, organizational culture, and climate risk governance.
• Regulatory Confidence: With access to detailed credit analysis models, data, and experienced professionals from a global information provider, the bank is better equipped to meet management and regulatory stakeholder requirements.

Takeaway

By collaborating with S&P Global Market Intelligence, this long-established bank was able to address the counterparty review backlog and transformed a challenging process into a more efficient operational workflow. S&P Global Market Intelligence can provide data, analytics and workflow solutions to support institutions to scale their risk functions more efficiently, while helping them manage resource use and maintain focus on strategic priorities.