While initially Basel II focuses on financially regulated businesses in the G10 countries, previous accords have been adopted in over 100 countries worldwide as good standard practice. It is predicted that Basel II will have even wider appeal.

It can not be ignored, that once these financial institutions are compliant, there will be somewhat of a vacuum between them and their non-regulated suppliers and partners. What we envisage taking place is a degree of voluntary conformance to the good practice of managing risk, and this having a significant ‘knock-on’ effect throughout the commercial world.

Risk management has always been vital to finance houses in their front office, credit and trading operations because the risk is where the money is made. Further back, in IT and general business operations the risks are not processed in the same way and Basel II