Black Swans and op risk

Daily news headlines

Nicholas Taleb, author of “The Black Swan”, will give the opening keynote address at OpRisk & Compliance magazine’s 10th annual OpRisk USA event in mid-February in New York.

Taleb, who will speak on “The Impact of the Highly Improbable”, describes himself as “an essayist, belletrist and researcher only interested in one single topic—chance.” He is also currently a professor at the London Business School, and holds a variety of other academic and professional interests.

“What is most exciting about this programme is the number and sheer variety of new speakers we have at our event—all with new and interesting presentations for our audience,” said Ellen Davis, editor of OpRisk & Compliance.

“Operational risk has been at a crossroads for the last 18 months,” she continues. “With this programme we hope to help executives—and the discipline—to evolve and develop their approaches to these risks. I firmly believe that recent market events have shown not only the importance for firms to have a robust operational risk framework, but also for operational risk to take the lead in enterprise-wide risk management initiatives.”

Top regulators are also contributing to the programme, including Patricia Meadow, first deputy of the State of New York Banking Department, who is speaking on “The Circle of Risk: The need to view Operating Risk as part of a seemless flow of risk analysis.” Grace Vogel, executive vice president of member regulation at Finra will be exploring “Lessons learned from the recent credit crunch and subprime problems.”

Other regulators on the programme include Patrick DeFontnouvelle, vice president, Supervision, Regulation & Credit, the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston; Theo Lubke, senior vice president, Bank Supervision Group, Federal Reserve Bank of New York; Alfred Seivold, senior examination specialist, FDIC; Andrew Sheen, manager, Operational Risk Policy, FSA (UK); and Kevin Bailey, deputy comptroller, Capital and Regulatory Policy, OCC.

The magazine also is celebrating its 10th anniversary of the OpRisk USA event with a special cocktail party, which will feature special celebrity guest comedian Alan Zweibel, multiple Emmy award winning comedy writer of “Saturday Night Live” and “Curb Your Enthusiasm.”

“This year’s OpRisk USA is now the must-attend event for the latest, cutting-edge thought leadership in the operational risk discipline,” says OpRisk & Compliance editor Davis. “Every year I look forward to meeting up with the most forward-thinking executives in the industry at our event, and listening to their ideas. I think this year will be the most exciting yet!”