First, carefully grasp the risk habits of the futures market.
1. Recognize the diversity of risks. Every link in the futures market has risks, and every participant has risks around him. For example, from the actor's point of view, investors have trading risks, futures companies have the risk of customers wearing positions, trading all members' performance risks and so on. If you want to manage risks well, you must have a scientific understanding of the diversity of risks and enhance the pertinence of risk prevention work.
2. Recognize the controllability of risks. Although the risks in the futures market are complex and diverse, they are constantly enhancing their "immunity" in the process of market development, and the means and experience of risk control by management institutions are also accumulating, making futures risk a controllable risk. The two-way trading mechanism itself makes the stop loss ability of futures trading quickly leave the market far stronger than spot trading; The emergence of derivatives such as options makes it possible to hedge futures risks; The accumulated experience and lessons of risk control can enable managers to make accurate judgments on risks; Strict risk control procedures are gradually becoming the core competitiveness of futures companies; The increasingly strict legal system and regulatory measures are also helping enterprises to deal with risks correctly. Therefore, the futures risk is not terrible, what is terrible is the lack of scientific understanding and scientific disposal methods of risks.
3. Understanding in place is the key to risk management. In order to manage the risks of futures companies, managers' understanding is the key. The first is the decision-making understanding of managers. In the short term, risk management often conflicts with business objectives, and managers must seek a reasonable balance between "risk control" and "business performance". This is almost a game, and the problem often happens between thoughts. This subjective understanding will determine the overall risk awareness of enterprises. The second is the understanding and judgment of various risks. This requires managers to be familiar with the manifestations of various risks, be able to accurately judge the risks that may occur in business activities, and deal with them in time. The risks of futures companies basically cover these two issues. Managers who are eager for quick success and quick performance often have the first problem, while new managers are more likely to have the second problem. It can be said that the scientific subjective understanding of risk is the core of risk management concept.
Second, strengthen the subjective understanding of risks.
1. Risk of violating laws and regulations. With the prosperity of commodity futures and the imminent launch of financial futures, futures companies have gained greater development space. In the process of vigorously developing business, various violations will continue to occur; These violations have a negative impact on major development issues such as the company's new business qualification approval. Therefore, this problem has become an important risk affecting the development of enterprises at present.
In fact, regulatory laws and regulations interpret risks from the perspective of countermeasures, so violation itself is creating risks. This is entirely a problem that managers know, and it is the result of the mismatch between managers' thinking and the legal environment and supervision environment.
2. The risk of improper management of intermediary institutions. This is the most controversial and complained issue in the futures market at present. On the surface, it seems that it has nothing to do with the company. Generally speaking, the middleman goes beyond the intermediary function and manages money on behalf of customers, but does not stress honesty, blocks information from customers, prevents customers from knowing their identity and trading situation, fails to implement the agreed stop loss line, or maliciously speculates to earn handling fees. , eventually leading to disputes. But it is also one of the important reasons why some companies deliberately blur the relationship with intermediaries.
3. Investors' risk education and bad risk disclosure. The trading mechanism and risk characteristics of futures market are different from other investment methods. However, in the past difficult operating period, futures companies often paid insufficient attention to investor education and risk disclosure. As a result, customers are often unclear about claims, insurance recovery and equality, and it is easy to have disputes with the company when risks occur.
4. Customer credit risk. The risk of futures market determines the high demand for investors' credit. In the customer transaction risk events that have happened, there is often a serious lack of customer integrity behind it, that is, it is difficult to pursue it through the warehouse.
The key to the above-mentioned risk prevention lies in managers' changing ideas, raising awareness and enhancing compliance awareness.
Three. Track the development and changes of market risks.
With the development and changes of the market, market risks are constantly manifested in new forms. Futures companies must strengthen the follow-up study of risk changes and adopt effective coping strategies.
1. Trading system risk. The market changes in the futures market are uncertain, and the fixed risk control system cannot fully adapt to the market changes. Especially in the past two years, with the active commodity futures in the international market, its risks have become more and more similar to financial futures. If the risk control work is still carried out according to the old routine, it is easy to have problems. Typically, the board keeps stopping, causing customers to wear positions. Although the risk controller has completed the work of adding and strengthening the notice according to the system, the risk may not be effectively controlled. This situation has occurred frequently in recent two years, indicating that a few companies' understanding of trading risks has not kept pace with market changes.
2. Restructuring and employee renewal risks. At present, futures companies are experiencing the peak of restructuring, and a large number of new shareholders, new managers and new employees are pouring into the industry, but their professional knowledge and experience are obviously insufficient. The new managers don't understand the responsibilities and functions of different departments and positions of futures companies, and they are seriously lacking in understanding the back-office departments such as settlement and risk control. Some new shareholders are unwilling to leave experienced personnel in the company, and make improper personnel arrangements for new departments and new positions, which may easily cause risks during the running-in period of newcomers.
In addition, with the large-scale reorganization of futures companies by financial institutions, a few financial institutions tend to adopt the division system for futures companies, which will become an important source of risk if the system arrangement is improper.
3. New business risks. With the development of the market, new regulations, new varieties and new mechanisms have appeared in recent years. New things themselves need to be run-in and tested in practice, especially after the introduction of financial futures, many similar problems may arise, such as the coordination of secondary settlement and the business operation mode of IB institutions, all of which need to be run-in, which is a link prone to problems.
4. Risk of manpower shortage. The expansion of business scale has led to changes in the workload of each position. Over the years, the talent pool in the industry is very limited, which has caused many problems in the company.
(1) Opening an account and signing a contract. Signing a contract is the first pass of risk management of futures companies, and there are many experiences and lessons in this respect in the past. With the increase of account opening and the introduction of IB system, the existing manpower will not meet the needs. Moreover, the contents of futures contracts are complex, there are many agreed items, and even there are some strict requirements for the signing process, so the newly added account holders are prone to omissions. At present, this risk is rising.
(2) The problem of insufficient manpower for risk control. The traditional risk control method of futures companies is manual, and the risk control personnel stare at the dynamic risk monitoring equipment and call customers once the risk rate exceeds the warning line. However, with the rapid increase in the number of customers, financial futures are about to appear, risk control personnel are in short supply, and the means are simple. The risk control link will face tremendous pressure and it will not be able to face a large number of risky customers in time.
(3) customer service. Due to the increase in the number of customers and the shortage of manpower in the company, some service functions of some companies may be transferred to IB institutions, and the services can't keep up and some problems caused by it are easy to cause customer disputes.
5. Technical risks. With the substantial increase in the number of customers and transaction volume, the technical level is facing a major test. Include personnel, software and hardware. In terms of personnel, there are problems in quantity and quality. In terms of software, there is always no industry technical specification, developers are in a monopoly position, and the new version of financial futures trading settlement software still lacks actual testing, which makes the current industry software full of uncertainty. In terms of hardware, there is no consensus on what kind of hardware system financial futures need. In addition, there are huge differences in system investment among companies, and problems may occur in all parts of computer systems.
6. Risks brought by fresh air control means. With the recent increase in market risks, futures companies are also actively studying new risk control methods to resolve risks. However, the adoption of new means has also brought some incidental problems.
(1) settlement plus within days. With the increase of transaction risk, the original daily debt-free settlement system can no longer meet the needs of risk control. At present, companies are generally studying the methods of instant settlement, issuing additional notices and strengthening intraday balance. But if it is not handled well, it will conflict with the old system and conflict with customers when dealing with risks.
(2) the service of the notice within days. After the company gradually began to adopt the method of intra-day settlement and addition, the notice delivery faced new difficulties. The regulations clearly require that the notice should be delivered to the customer, but the off-site transaction makes it impossible to know the instant contact between the company and the customer. Mail checking, which is widely used in some areas, is more suitable for the delivery of post-day notifications, but it is necessary to find a more reasonable way to deliver instant notifications actively in the conversation.
Fourth, people-oriented, improve the system and mechanism
To deal with all kinds of risks, in addition to individual countermeasures, we should generally grasp three key points: first, people-oriented, second, paying attention to the system, and third, innovating risk control mechanisms and means.
1. People-oriented. The key to risk management lies in people. First, we must comprehensively strengthen the legal knowledge training of employees. In the past two years, with the goal of risk control, Beijing has continuously carried out high-intensity training for all staff and achieved practical results. Second, strengthening the summary and education of practical experience and lessons of risk control is an effective way to alleviate the contradiction between business surge and lack of manpower and experience. Third, gradually strengthen the staffing of risk control related links. In the past, the staffing level based on the underdeveloped futures industry is outdated and must be changed in time. Fourth, it is necessary to maintain the stability of the workforce, especially those involved in risk control, to prevent large-scale personnel flow from causing risks. For the behavior of blindly pulling people, the regulatory authorities should take an attitude of dissuasion or even appropriate control. Fifth, strengthen the supervision of employees, especially middle and senior managers, and force employees to improve their consciousness of standardized operation and risk prevention by high pressure.
2. Strengthen system construction. With the change of the market, the responsibilities and working procedures of all departments and positions of the company should be adjusted in time to actively respond to market risks. First, implement the concept of risk control in the company's organizational setup, and add branch management departments on the basis of existing audit and risk control departments. The second is to strengthen the overall coordination of risk control and compliance work within the company.