[ N E T W O R K M A N A G E M E N T ] difficulties , internal demands for information that need to be handled by the network team can be sudden and substantial , as in the case of Credit Suisse prior to its acquisition . A comprehensive assessment of account exposures may – and in some cases did – fall to the global management team .
Another internal pain point can be compliance with the demands of regulators and supervisors . One current example for European network managers is the need to review arrangements with their agents in the event of their own bank going into resolution . According to one manager , speaking on condition of anonymity , this can result in a somewhat Kafkaesque experience . “ The European Central Bank want us to assign to each agent that we use some measure of how critical they are to us . If they meet a certain threshold , we have to write a contingency plan for what would happen if we were to go into resolution .” In such an event , they explain , “ The ECB would send in its team and they need to have a plan per agent to know exactly what to do with this agent when their team steps in and our management moves out . It all comes down to network management , because we know the agents . Though other parts of the bank manage the risk and the credit line , we coordinate it and we get a lot of feedback from within our organisation to write these plans . But we have had to take on two people for this project , which recurs annually .” The reports need to be checked , double-checked and any new critical intermediaries have to be added to the list . So far , so onerous . But the manager explains : “ We ’ re running into the problem that we go to the agents and we say , ‘ How would you treat us if we were to be in resolution ?’ They say , ‘ well , we don ’ t know . There ’ s no set arrangement in our custody agreement that addresses how we would treat you .’ They all say they would look at the situation at the time . Sometimes my contingency plan for an agent says they just don ’ t know , which is fine . That ’ s just the answer . I can ’ t force it out of them . But it ’ s created a lot of work . I would like network management as an industry to have all the agents come up with a statement and add it to the custody agreement .” More visible and certainly openly on the agenda for public discussion is the question of how to incorporate digital asset servicing into the network function . Can exist-
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