Tag: risk management

Digital and mobile technology is continually evolving and advancing, creating new ways to pay; from mobile wallets to peer-to-peer to digital currency, the modern payments landscape has evolved past simply cards and cash. Consumers, eager to adopt these new ways to pay, are changing their purchasing habits to meet these emerging methods.

Environmental, social and governance (ESG) matters rapidly rose up the corporate agenda in 2019, such that ESG is now a mainstream issue across all areas of corporate life, including in mergers and acquisitions (M&A). Our M&A in 2020: The New Normal report takes a closer look at this key trend that has come to the fore in the past 12 months due to increased awareness of climate change, unease with globalisation, and pressure from activists and consumers.

Rising global headwinds, heightened market volatility and the growing threat of a global recession mean that, as we approach the end of the current economic cycle, ensuring that your investment portfolio has the appropriate safety measures in place is more important than ever. But while we’ve all heard the adage that the key to managing risk is diversification, the truth is that this is only half the story.

The liability risks that South African businesses face as a result of possible product defects, are increasing by orders of magnitude with each passing year, and our Specialist Risk Review has revealed that as many as 21% of businesses have been faced with a product liability claim in the past five years.

A new report by The Small Business Institute (SBI) claims that small businesses continue to be as economically fragile as they were over two decades ago, with some 70% of South Africa’s emerging small businesses failing within their first two years. While 98.5% of the country’s economy is made up of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), they’re only delivering 28% of all jobs.

The year-long listeriosis outbreak in 2018, the Boeing 737 crashes in 2018 and 2019, and the collapse of the M1 Grayston Bridge in October 2015 are but a few out of many instances linked to some form of human error in business, frequently with long-term consequences.

Given current threat levels, all organisations should assume that they will experience some sort of cyber security incident sooner or later—probably sooner. Plan for the worst and, most important of all, know what to do when an incident occurs.

When it comes to successful investing, there is no goose that lays the golden egg. So, while passive versus active investing is often presented as a simple either/or, in reality there should never be a binary choice between active or passive investment vehicles as the sole solution to your investment needs.

Participants in 2019 Global Risk Management Survey ranked cyberattacks and data breaches as #6 in the top 10 risks currently facing organisations. The risk entered the Top 10 list for the first time (at #9) in 2015 and is projected to go from #6 to #3 in the next three years. As a result it is seen as no longer an if, but when a business will experience a cyber attack.

In celebrating the Youth Month, we are reminded that the uprising that began in Soweto more than 40 years ago was all about education, and how it profoundly changed the socio-political landscape of the country.