Bank Technology News articles from June 2003

Bank Technology News archives from June 2003

BRAND ANALYSIS: What's in a Name? A Heck of a Lot.(Industry Overview)
June 1, 2003... Market research teams with CRM for answers decoding the connection between brand and the bottom line is an elusive pursuit that some consultants say is within reach- and much needed-in financial services where brands are underutilized assets....

CYBER SECURITY: Banks' Arsenal Grows Larger: Fighting viruses, hackers and all things "e-vil".(Industry Overview)
June 1, 2003... Ask bob justus about the scope of cyber security issues facing banking, and he doesn't mince words. "This whole thing is gigantic," says the svp of corporate information security at Union Bank of California. "We're deploying as many layers as...

RISK MANAGEMENT: Basel II: Burden Or Opportunity?(Industry Overview)
June 1, 2003... Savvy banks know the price is worth it banks that embrace rather than resist Basel II, the mammoth proposal designed to control operational and credit risk, will claim a greater competitive advantage in the marketplace, say technology analysts....

Editor's Note.(Correction Notice)
June 1, 2003... In "Getting Serious About Check 21," (May 2003), BTN incorrectly reported that Steve Rasmussen works for Fiserv's information technology business unit. Mr. Rasmussen is employed by Information Technology, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of...

Difficult Times Call For Truly Creative Measures: Times may be tough and expectations a bit unrealistic, but technology is as crucial as ever xpect the savvier of firms to prove their mettle.
June 1, 2003... 2003 hasn't exactly been a party. but tough times do not mean that innovation has to come to a screeching halt because of the dead economy, the rash of corporate scandals to rock investors and the tumultuous state of global affairs. Business...

....NewsMakers....NewsMakers....NewsMakers....
June 1, 2003... Where's My Russian Babe? Attorney General John Ashcroft has charged 135 people and seized $17 million in a crackdown on investment swindles, identity theft and other forms of Internet fraud and abuse. Suspects are accused of a variety of...

Firms Flaunt Transparency to Regain Investor Confidence.(Industry Overview)
June 1, 2003... As the season of corporate scandals dissipates, banks with brokerage arms are making their business processes more transparent in a bid to regain client confidence and to woo investors back to the markets. Not surprisingly, technology is...

E-Fraud Fight Prompts Credit Agencies' Cooperation.(Equifax, Experian and TransUnion )
June 1, 2003... The battle against e-thieves has been joined on a number of fronts, and now is being fought in the nation's consumer credit reporting firms. Equifax, Experian and TransUnion have banded together to allow fraud victims to notify the credit...

Latin America SCM Sputters, But Brazil's SPB Shines.(Sistemas de Pagamentos Brasileiro)
June 1, 2003... For many nations in latin America, gaining efficiencies in supply chain management (SCM) is often one step forward-and two steps back. The region's tech gurus will have to run to catch up. Though speeding up the transaction flow among...

Whistleblowers Get A Cloaking Device.(Anonymizer's SECtips.com)
June 1, 2003... Those who play fast and loose with the rules of commerce will always find a way to get away-but it's getting much harder for the crooks to threaten would-be Jeffrey Wigands into silence. A new product called SECtips.com ensures total...

TECHIES.
June 1, 2003... Karen Wendel has been named CEO of Identrus, a company formed by the world's leading banks-ABN Amro, Bank of America, Bankers Trust, Barclays, JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup, Deutsche Bank and Hypo Vereinsbank-to provide identity authentication and...

Message Board.
June 1, 2003... "It was the only thing available, and it doesn't work very well." Chuck Williams, president of InQuira on the ineffectiveness of search engines, part of a pitch for new search technology "You cannot have a payments system without an...

By the Numbers.(Industry Overview)
June 1, 2003... Total it spending in the American Securies industry is set to decline for the second year in a row. That's not just a big story, it's a huge one. At an industry level, IT spending had always increased year-over-year since the 1970s, according...

Dorado's Buzz on Mortgage Origination.(according to Joseph W. Jennings)(Interview)
June 1, 2003... Web services function like worker bees constantly hovering around the queen: They quietly provide a protective structure around the beehive. San Mateo, CA-based Dorado Corp., doesn't mind being that silent protector. Dorado's software and...

Sales Performance: Breaking Out Of the Norm: Financial firms look for ways to help sales reps focus on an entire product line instead of a few favorites.
June 1, 2003... Firms spend millions of dollars and countless hours pondering strategy to retain customers, yet the challenge often comes down to getting salespeople to mentally break out of their comfort zones and focus on an entire product line instead of...

Corporate BONDS: Investment Banks Find Strength and Liquidity In Numbers: With bonds offsetting some market volatility, firms have banded together to spur liquidity through a shared platform.(using CreditGrades from RiskMetrics)
June 1, 2003... One of the few bright spots in the capital markets this year has been corporate bonds; not only has bond trading driven revenue at many Wall Street firms, it's been a good year for investors, who have seen prices continue to climb as interest...

Blue Frog Leaps to Top of Heap with Annuity Product.
June 1, 2003... As banks began dominating the sale of annuities in the last decade, officials have long sought the Holy Grail: totally automated, seamless, end-to-end communication between insurance carriers and banks that eases the processing headache. ...

Personal Service for the Semi-High Net Worthers.(using Quadstone's software)
June 1, 2003... Firms spend a lot of time focused on the wealthiest of their clients, and with good reason. But there's lots of money to be made among the emerging affluent, particularly for firms that can spot trends early on that define this tech-savvy...

Banks Warm to E-Lures in Small Business Market.
June 1, 2003... Small businesses are frequently referred to as the engine driving the economy, and with nearly 25 million of them in the U.S., it's not hard to see why. Banks have only recently turned their attention to them as a market for on-line...

In Credit Card Lawsuit, Biggest Winner is Debit Card.( MasterCard International and Visa USA )
June 1, 2003... The fallout from the surprise deal last month between MasterCard International and Visa USA to settle a lawsuit over fees is likely to roughly resurface-rather than level-the playing field between retailers and credit card companies. And credit...

A Room with a View: Fidelity's usability lab-formally known as Fidelity Center for Applied Technology-puts function to the test. While other R&D efforts in the financial community have fizzled with the dot-com bust, FCAT is going strong.
June 1, 2003... Conventional wisdom ONCE said the best way to draw attention to an important message on a Web page was to put the information into a colorful, eye-catching graphic at the top of the screen. That's what officials at the Boston-based Fidelity...

Content Only Counts if it's Processed.
June 1, 2003... With multiple channels and myriad customer demands before them, banks are looking for more efficient ways to process documents and pull data from various points across the enterprise. It isn't glamorous, but it's more than necessary. ...

Keynote Hits High Octave with New Bank Index.
June 1, 2003... Banks that want to make sure their Web sites are keeping up with those of the Joneses may have found a friend in Keynote Systems, which this month launched a Web site index that benchmarks on-line performance of banks. The Keynote...

'Saturn of Mortgage Biz' Speeds to Record Sales: E*Trade Mortgage hits $2.5 billion for the first quarter.
June 1, 2003... As the 800-pound gorilla in the e-mortgage space, E*Trade Mortgage has bet the house on maintaining its soft and fuzzy consumer image. And that public perception has paid off in other ways, such as cross-selling: 26 percent of the firm's...

Charter One Builds a Better Mouse Trap.
June 1, 2003... Charter one believes in mouse control, particularly the electronic kind. "We like to keep things to a two-click rule, so people don't have to dig for information," says Donna Winfield, vp and interactive marketing manager for Charter One, which...

Performance Managment: An IT Battle Assessment.(Industry Overview)
June 1, 2003... Southern General Financial is a regional insurance company with aggressive plans to make its footprint much larger, a risky proposition in an unpredictable environment where every dollar counts. "As a growing company, we're trying to build in...

Spam-Cutting Rules May Aid Legitimate Marketers.
June 1, 2003... E-mail marketing regulations recently proposed by the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) could go a long way in supporting companies' legitimate on-line marketing efforts, while making it more difficult for "spammers" to abuse the power of the...

How to Verify If Employees are Really, Truly Working.(Industry Overview)
June 1, 2003... The internet has transformed the way financial institutions do business. Pushing papers has been replaced by mouse-clicks and keystrokes mployees now use the Web to research and process quotes, communicate with co-workers via e-mail, issue...