THE NUMBER · THE BANK · CAPITAL
A bank holds US$900m of capital against US$10bn of risk-weighted assets, a ratio of 9%. A loan book goes bad and it writes off US$200m. Assume its risk-weighted assets are unchanged.
// ← EVERY SEATTHE FUNCTIONS
Every floor · The machinery
Regulatory Reporting Analyst
Produces the returns the bank's regulator relies on — capital, liquidity, large exposures, credit quality.
BY MICHAEL SHANG · SIXTEEN YEARS IN COMMERCIAL BANKING · UPDATED
// 01 — WHAT A REGULATORY REPORTING ANALYST DOES
The returns are defined by rules rather than by accounting standards, so the work is as much interpretation as production: deciding how an exposure is classified, what risk weight it carries and what the rule actually requires. Errors here are not internal — they are reported, corrected publicly and remembered.
// 02 — WHO ARRIVES HERE
Accounting and finance backgrounds, moves from financial control, and people from regulators or advisory practices.
// 03 — WHAT THE INTERVIEW ASKS
These are the shapes the round takes, not a question bank — banks phrase them differently and the wording is never the point.
- 01What is a risk-weighted asset, in plain words?
- 02This exposure could be classified two ways. How do you decide?
- 03A return has gone out with an error. Walk me through what happens.
- 04How do you keep up when the rules change?
- 05Why does capital matter to a bank that is profitable?
- 06How would you explain a ratio movement to an executive?
What the panel is listening for. Comfort with rules as text — reading them closely, applying them consistently, and documenting the judgment where they are ambiguous.
The finance, technology and operations quiz has no question for this seat yet. Its five were asked for the software engineer, financial accountant, operations analyst, procurement manager and people partner seats, in the same block, and the temperament they score is the one this panel scores too.
Take the quiz →// 04 — ONE QUESTION, WORKED
QThis exposure could be classified two ways. How do you decide?
A strong answer goes to the text of the rule and its guidance first, then to the substance of the exposure — what the bank actually holds, who is obliged to pay, what the security is — and to how the bank has classified the same kind of exposure before. The judgment is documented with the alternative considered, taken to the interpretation forum if it is material, and applied consistently afterwards. The capital impact is calculated and reported; it is not what decides the answer.
A weak one picks the classification with the lower risk weight, or the one the business prefers, and documents it afterwards.
The seat rewards comfort with rules as text — read closely, applied consistently, with the judgment written down where the text runs out — and an error here is corrected publicly and remembered. Many classifications rest on a credit judgment made somewhere else in the bank, and knowing what a watchlist, a downgrade or an intensive-care file looks like on the desk makes the data easier to challenge.
START HERE · Issue 09 — a portfolio review
THE IN-TRAY · ONE MINUTE
Make the call on one file.
A short file on the ground this page covers. Every option opens with how far it sits from a senior banker’s read.
1 FILES · PICK A CALL ON ANY OF THEM
3 MORE ON THE BANK · CAPITAL →WHERE DO YOU READ FROM? THE PLACEMENT →
// ALSO IN THE FUNCTIONS
- Financial accountant
- Product controller
- Treasury analyst
- Software engineer
- Cyber security analyst
- Data scientist
- Business analyst
- Operations analyst
- Legal counsel
- People partner
- Marketing manager
- Procurement manager
The whole board, and how the four blocks fit together, is on what jobs banks hire for.
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