The Risk Management Association - In Brief

Founded in 1914, The Risk Management Association (RMA), is a not-for-profit, member-driven professional association - whose sole purpose is to advance the use of sound risk principles in the financial services industry. The RMA promotes an enterprise approach to risk management which focusses on credit risk, market risk, operational risk, securities lending and regulatory issues.

Headquartered in Philadelphia in the United States, the RMA has approximately 2,500 institutional members. These include banks of all sizes as well as non-bank financial institutions. They are represented in the association by 16,000 risk management professionals who are chapter members in financial centres throughout North America, Europe, and the Asia/Pacific region.

The RMA's strong relationship with our members and with regulators helps us to develop new risk management techniques and innovative products. Our educational and training programmes are geared towards helping risk management professionals at every stage of their careers. Over 70% of the RMA's revenue is derived from providing products and services to its members.

Because the RMA does not lobby it has been able to take a leadership role in providing industry input to regulators as they reform the Basel Capital Accord, first instituted in 1988. In so doing - RMA has provided the Basel Committee with a significant body of research outlining the process for estimating economic capital.

With the support of our members, the RMA develops leading-edge risk management products, services and studies, some of which are listed below.

RMA Round-tables

Our round-tables bring together small groups of senior bankers who have a common interest in a particular topic. Over the course of a day or two, these groups explore ongoing and emerging opportunities and issues in an environment which provides both formal and informal opportunities for sharing ideas. Attendance at RMA round-tables is by invitation-only in order to ensure common interest among the participants for each event. Round-table topics include the following:

• Compliance
• Consumer, Retail, and Small Business
• Credit and Lending
• Loan Operations
• Loan Review
• Market Risk
• Middle Market
• Operational Risk
• Policy
• Portfolio Management
• Real Estate
• Risk Management
• Securities Lending Custody
• Workout

The RMA/Wharton Advanced Risk Management Programme 
The first advanced programme on risk management for executives. The programme addresses a critical need in the industry for the integration of risk management with financial management and strategy and to address real-world challenges, reflecting today's economic issues. Institutions nominate those executives on track to lead or oversee divisional or enterprise-wide risk management functions to attend.

The RMA Journal®
The official magazine of the RMA, which provides thought-provoking and informative articles from industry leaders in two convenient formats: print and online. It is published ten times a year.

RMA Conferences and Forums 
The RMA organises several issue-specific conferences each year in addition to our Risk Management Conference (each autumn) and the Chapter Leaders Conference (each June). Recognised industry leaders and commentators address the conferences, offering their insights into current trends and best practices. Conferences include:

GCOR - The Governance Compliance and Operational Risk Conference. Focussed on global operational risk and its role in the financial institution. 

Annual Conference on Securities Lending. The original industry- wide conference sponsored and developed    by securities lending and borrowing professionals for securities lending and borrowing professionals.

Thought Leadership

The RMA relies on our members for input and feedback as we undertake studies to help better identify, assess and manage risks. This includes questionnaires, benchmarking studies and best practice papers in the following areas:

Risk Appetite. Joint research by Oliver Wyman and The Risk Management Association on establishing a risk appetite framework through governance, culture and metrics.

Enterprise Data to Support Credit Risk Management. RMA and Automated Financial Systems (AFS) survey on the state of data to support credit risk management.

RMA Capital Working Group. Established in 1999, this group provides the Basel Committee with analysis and continuing research into how institutions measure and allocate economic capital.

Market Risk. Credit approval and limits management processes survey. Focusses on both trading and non-trading businesses.

European Risk Analysis Service. This is an alliance between the RMA and AFS to provide a credit risk benchmarking service to accurately measure risk profiles in defined portfolio segments relative to the industry.

For more information, please contact your representative:

Mark Heaton
Senior Regional Consultant, Europe
The Risk Management Association
27 Old Gloucester Street
London
WC1N 3AX

Tel 44 (0) 1732852225
Mob 44 (0) 7976722851

mheaton@rmahq.org