case-study
Financial Risk Group (FRG): Using FINCAD to Integrate Analytics with Risk Systems

  HIGHLIGHTS

 

Client: Financial Risk Group (FRG)

FRG_logo

 

Objectives

Deliver a risk management system flexible enough to accommodate diverse instruments and evaluate risk across the enterprise 

Requirements

  • Flexible derivatives analytics library able to integrate with SAS risk solution
  • Model portfolios with over 30 different types of derivatives

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"FINCAD not only had the coverage to support our client’s valuation needs, but the solution contains extensive documentation of all its models and functions, providing the transparency our client needed for regulatory compliance."

Ronald Holanek, President, The Financial Risk Group

Background

Financial Risk Group (FRG) provides international risk management services. FRG’s offerings leverage the SAS risk solution and FINCAD derivatives analytics library, helping clients implement enterprise-wide market risk management systems covering a range of financial instruments. 

Challenge 

FRG’s client, one of the top 10 largest US banks, was looking for ways to enhance its portfolio and predictive modeling capabilities, in order to improve risk-adjusted returns and make more efficient use of capital. FRG identified that the bank’s multiple risk management systems across various business units were creating inefficiencies due to dissimilar valuation and risk measurement techniques. The different platforms also made it difficult to get an enterprise-wide view of risks.

Solution 

FRG selected FINCAD for its client, based on FINCAD's breadth of coverage, ease of use, and comprehensive documentation. FINCAD proved to be an ideal fit for the client because it: 

  • integrated well with SAS,
  • provided the bank the transparency it needed,
  • and handled the bank’s diverse, cross-asset instrument needs, from large fixed income portfolios to complex interest rate derivatives.

Results 

FRG was able to successfully implement its client’s risk management system by integrating FINCAD with SAS. Results include: 

Easy Development: “FINCAD's tools for developers are extremely versatile to develop with. The magnitude of the function library and coverage is amazing," said Ladekarl.

Consistency: "From a development standpoint, I like the consistency across the functions. This consistency applies not only to the pricing functions, but also to the curve and volatility functions. This reduced our time to market for the implementation,” said Holanek.  

Integration: FRG used FINCAD for Excel as a prototyping tool for the project. “The two products, built using the same analytics library, are great complementary tools as you can integrate the functions from FINCAD's developer tools into your risk management system,” said Ladekarl.

Thorough Documentation: With the FINCAD derivatives analytics library, every model is fully documented. Users are able to review the mathematics behind the functions and instruments and every point on the curve can be viewed.

Holistic View of Risk: With the integration between SAS and FINCAD, FRG’s client is now valuing more than 6,000 positions from multiple business units daily, giving the bank the details needed to manage risk effectively.

Looking Forward

Building on its success integrating FINCAD with SAS for its banking client, FRG has engaged in similar projects with other clients. In all these projects, FINCAD is relied on heavily for the valuation or pricing component of the risk management systems.


"FINCAD’s documentation is so extensive and detailed, that I’ve used it to train some of our clients about the models and risk statistics used for specific derivatives. It has become an invaluable part of our clients’ risk management processes." 

Ronald Holanek, President of FRG