Description

A focused course, tailored for you

The FI Counterparty Surveillance Playbook for Broker-Custodians

A working method for FI risk analysts who own the daily counterparty watchlist at a broker-custodian or wealth platform: refresh the file, escalate cleanly, defend the call.

The watchlist refresh has to land before the weekly Credit Committee, and the methodology has to hold up when the trade desk pushes back on a sublimit cut.

$199 one-time

Tailored to your situation. Access within 24 hours. 30-day money-back.

Includes a hand-built implementation playbook delivered alongside course access, generated for your specific situation.

Why this course

FI risk analysts at broker-custodian and wealth platforms sit between the trade desk wanting capacity, Credit Risk wanting documented methodology, and Treasury wanting a defensible cash-management view. A counterparty book at a large broker-custodian is dominated by deposit-taking banks where uncollateralised sweep balances sit, custody and clearing banks where settlement exposure concentrates, money-market funds where intraday liquidity parks, and a tail of corporate trust and agency banks. Each of those buckets has different early-warning indicators and different escalation paths. Call report ratios move quarterly. IDC and FFIEC composite pricing moves weekly. CDS, senior unsecured spreads, and equity-implied volatility move intraday. Reconciling those signals into one watchlist refresh that survives the trade desk asking 'why did you cut my line' and Credit Risk asking 'what is your methodology' is the actual job. The course gives the analyst a defensible end-to-end method for that refresh, the escalation memo, and the two-page committee write-up.

What you walk away with

Run a defensible weekly FI counterparty watchlist refresh that survives trade-desk pushback and Credit Risk methodology review.
Combine call report ratios, IDC and FFIEC pricing, CDS, and bond-spread signals into a single early-warning score without double-counting.
Write a one-page sublimit-change rationale that Credit Risk accepts on first read and the trade desk cannot pick apart.
Build a custodian and clearing-bank monitoring file that triangulates settlement exposure, intraday credit, and concentration.
Produce a two-page Credit Committee write-up that ends with a clear keep, watch, or reduce recommendation and the evidence behind it.

The 12 modules

Module 1. The FI counterparty book at a broker-custodian: what actually sits in it

Maps the counterparty exposures a broker-custodian, wealth platform, or trust bank actually runs. Uninsured sweep deposits at partner banks, settlement and free-credit balances at clearing and custody banks, intraday at agent banks, repo and reverse-repo cash legs, and money-market fund holdings inside cash-equivalent sleeves. Each bucket gets a different early-warning model, a different sublimit logic, and a different escalation owner. The module ends with a worked counterparty inventory template the analyst can populate against their own book.

Module 2. Call report extraction for US deposit-taking counterparties

Pulls the FFIEC call report fields that actually matter for FI counterparty risk and walks through the quarter-on-quarter reading that catches deterioration before the headlines. Uninsured deposit share, brokered deposit growth, held-to-maturity unrealised loss to tangible common equity, commercial real estate concentration, securities portfolio duration, loan loss provision trend, and Texas ratio. Module hands the analyst a call report scoring sheet covering the regional and money-center banks typically in a broker-custodian counterparty book.

Module 3. Custodian and clearing-bank monitoring

Builds the monitoring file for the three or four custody and clearing banks that sit under most US broker-custodian books. DTC and Fed settlement exposure, agent-bank intraday credit, segregation and asset-protection regime, parent-bank financial condition, and operational-resilience signals coming out of regulatory examinations. Module includes the custodian monitoring template, the questions to send to the custodian relationship team quarterly, and the criteria for moving a custodian to enhanced monitoring.

Module 4. Money-market fund counterparty surveillance

Treats money-market fund holdings as the counterparty exposure they actually are. Reads SEC Form N-MFP monthly filings to assess weighted average maturity, daily and weekly liquid assets, sponsor support history, gates and fees regime under the post-2023 SEC reforms, and the concentration of the fund in any single issuer. Module shows the analyst the file the cash-management team needs back when the trade desk asks to add or shift a prime fund inside the cash-equivalent sleeve.

Module 5. Market-implied signals: CDS, senior unsecured spreads, equity-implied volatility

Triangulates the daily market signals into a single early-warning score the analyst can defend. How to read CDS levels and the basis to senior unsecured cash bonds, how to spot when the equity is moving before the CDS, and how to flag the cases where market signals are clean noise rather than information. Includes the spreadsheet for normalising spreads against a peer index of US regional and money-center banks so a one-name move shows up against the right baseline.

Module 6. Combining the signals without double-counting

The methodology module. How to weight call report ratios, IDC and FFIEC composite pricing, CDS and bond spreads, and equity-implied volatility into one watchlist score where each input contributes information rather than restating the same data point. Walks through the trap of stacking three credit-spread variants and calling it three signals. Module hands over the scoring sheet, the weighting framework, and the methodology footnote Credit Risk wants to see attached to the watchlist.

Module 7. The sublimit framework: keep, watch, reduce

Translates the watchlist score into the sublimit action. What triggers a move from monitoring to enhanced monitoring, what triggers a sublimit haircut, and what triggers a full counterparty pause. The framework distinguishes uninsured sweep deposit lines from settlement lines from money-market fund concentration caps, because each has a different recovery profile if the counterparty deteriorates. Module includes the sublimit grid the analyst can attach to the credit policy.

Module 8. Writing the escalation memo that gets actioned

Covers the one-page escalation memo that goes from analyst to Credit Risk Head and Treasury. The opening line that frames the name and the action requested, the four-bullet evidence block, the methodology footnote that pre-empts the 'how did you arrive at this' question, and the recommended action with a clear keep, watch, or reduce ask. Module includes three worked memos covering a regional-bank deposit name, a custody bank, and a prime money-market fund.

Module 9. Handling trade-desk pushback

Prepares the analyst for the conversation when the trade desk pushes back on a sublimit cut. The defensible position rests on methodology, not on opinion, so the module covers how to walk the desk through the scoring sheet, how to respond when the desk argues 'the spread is just noise', and how to escalate cleanly when the desk asks Credit Risk to override the analyst. Includes the meeting template and the post-meeting summary that goes on the file.

Module 10. The weekly Credit Committee two-page write-up

The committee write-up format that ends with a clear keep, watch, or reduce recommendation supported by the evidence behind it. Page one carries the watchlist with name, current sublimit, recommended action, and the three lines of rationale. Page two carries the methodology footnote, the data sources, and any names where the recommendation diverges from the score. Module includes the two-page template and three worked examples drawn from broker-custodian counterparty books.

Module 11. Regulatory expectations: OCC heightened standards, FRB SR letters, FDIC, FINRA, SEC 15c3

Maps the regulatory expectations the FI counterparty function has to satisfy. OCC heightened standards for risk governance, FRB SR letters on counterparty credit risk management, FDIC supervisory letters on uninsured-deposit concentration, FINRA expectations for broker-custodian counterparty oversight, and SEC Rule 15c3-3 segregation and reserve formula implications for custody-bank selection. The module is not a legal reading; it is the analyst-facing translation of what the examiner asks for at the next exam cycle.

Module 12. From analyst to FI counterparty risk subject-matter owner

Closes with the path from running the weekly watchlist to owning the counterparty methodology. What the FI Risk Manager role looks like from the inside, the artefacts that move an analyst into that conversation (the methodology paper, the annual sublimit review, the regulatory exam response), and the skill stack senior roles look for. Module hands over a 90-day personal artefact plan the analyst can run to produce evidence of ownership at the next review cycle.

How this addresses your situation

Specific modules that map to what you said you are dealing with.

The Tuesday watchlist refresh has a regional-bank name that gapped wider on CDS, but the call report ratios are stable. Module 5 plus Module 6 give the analyst the methodology to weight the signals so the recommendation is defensible against trade-desk pushback.

Treasury asks to add a new prime money-market fund to the cash-equivalent sleeve. Module 4 walks the N-MFP read and the concentration check. Module 8 supplies the escalation memo if the analyst recommends a lower cap than Treasury asked for.

A custodian has a parent-bank earnings miss. Module 3 plus Module 11 give the analyst the monitoring file and the regulatory framing for the conversation the custodian relationship team needs to have.

Credit Risk sends the watchlist back asking 'what is the weighting methodology?' Module 6 plus the methodology footnote in Module 10 are the documents that answer that question once and for all.

What you get with this course

Twelve written modules in the Art of Service learning environment, each with worked examples drawn from a broker-custodian or trust-bank counterparty book.
Downloadable templates: counterparty inventory sheet, FFIEC call report scoring sheet, custodian monitoring template, N-MFP money-market fund scoring sheet, market-signal triangulation spreadsheet, sublimit grid, escalation memo template, Credit Committee two-page write-up template.
Hand-built implementation playbook tuned to the buyer's actual counterparty book and reporting cadence.
Worked sample weekly watchlist refresh covering a regional bank, a custody bank, and a prime money-market fund.

What you will have in hand by Day 1, Week 1, Month 1

Within 24 hours: account in the Art of Service learning environment is provisioned and the hand-built implementation playbook is delivered alongside it.

Week one: counterparty inventory and call report scoring sheet populated against the buyer's book.

Week two to four: market-signal triangulation, sublimit grid, and escalation memo template adopted into the weekly cycle.

Week five onward: the two-page Credit Committee write-up format becomes the standing artefact.

Before and after

Before

The weekly watchlist refresh takes most of Monday and Tuesday, the methodology is partly in the analyst's head, and the trade desk knows it can argue any sublimit cut down because the rationale is not written in a way that holds up under pushback.

After

The refresh runs on a documented method, the scoring sheet and methodology footnote are attached to the watchlist, the one-page escalation memo lands cleanly, and the Credit Committee two-pager ends with a recommendation that survives both the trade desk and Credit Risk review.

What happens if you do not address this

When the next regional-bank stress event hits, the analyst who cannot point to a documented methodology and a defensible scoring sheet is the analyst who gets second-guessed in front of Credit Risk and Treasury. The cost is not just one bad call, it is the loss of standing as the owner of the FI counterparty methodology.

Who it is for

An FI risk analyst inside a large US broker-custodian, wealth platform, or trust bank counterparty function. The analyst owns or contributes to the daily or weekly counterparty watchlist, the sublimit framework, and the escalation memos that go to Credit Risk and Treasury. The book is heavy on US regional and money-center banks, custodian and clearing banks, government and prime money-market funds, and a tail of corporate trust counterparties. The analyst is the one Credit Risk calls when a name on the watchlist gaps wider, and the one the trade desk argues with when a sublimit gets cut.

Who this is NOT for. Not for hedge-fund prime-brokerage credit analysts whose book is mostly hedge fund counterparties rather than deposit-taking institutions. Not for corporate credit analysts covering non-financials. Not for retail risk or fraud analysts. Not for sell-side bank equity research analysts covering financials externally.

How it arrives

Text-based course in the Art of Service learning environment, plus downloadable templates and worked examples for every module, plus the hand-built implementation playbook delivered alongside course access.

Time investment. About four to six hours per module, run over four to six weeks at one to two modules a week, fitted around the weekly watchlist refresh cycle. The templates start producing usable artefacts from Module 2 onward.

Why $199 is the right number

GARP and PRMIA cover counterparty credit risk at a generalist level, mostly skewed to derivatives counterparties on a dealer book rather than deposit-taker and custody-bank exposures on a broker-custodian book. SR 11-10 model risk training and OCC heightened standards reading lists give the regulatory frame but not the working method. Bank-internal credit training tends to focus on corporate credit underwriting rather than FI counterparty surveillance. This course is built specifically for the FI counterparty seat at a broker-custodian, wealth platform, or trust bank, with the templates and the committee write-up format that role actually produces.

FAQ

Is this US-only or does it cover non-US bank counterparties?

The core templates are US-centric because FFIEC call reports, SEC Form N-MFP, and OCC heightened standards are the primary reference frame for a US broker-custodian counterparty book. Non-US bank counterparties (typically a tail of European and Canadian global banks on the custody and clearing side) are covered in Module 3, with the equivalent EBA Pillar 3 and OSFI disclosure reads.

I do not have access to a paid CDS data feed. Does Module 5 still work?

Yes. Module 5 covers the free and broker-distributed market signals (bond yields off TRACE, equity-implied volatility off listed options, FFIEC composite pricing for held-to-maturity reads), and shows where a CDS feed adds information versus where the cash-bond spread already carries the signal. The triangulation method works whether or not the seat has a Markit CDS feed.

How much of this is methodology and how much is the actual templates?

Roughly forty per cent methodology, sixty per cent working templates. The methodology modules (1, 6, 7, 11) carry the reasoning the analyst has to be able to defend. The template modules (2, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10) hand over the artefacts the analyst produces every week.

Does the implementation playbook get tuned to my actual counterparty book?

Yes. The hand-built implementation playbook is produced for the buyer after purchase, tuned to the actual counterparty mix (regional vs money-center bank weight, custody-bank concentration, money-market fund sleeve composition) and to the buyer's reporting cadence (daily, weekly, or fortnightly watchlist refresh).

30-day money-back guarantee. If after a week of working through the materials this is not what you needed, reply to the receipt email and a full refund is processed. No questions, no forms.

Within 24 hours your account in the learning environment is provisioned and the tailored implementation playbook is delivered alongside it.