Citibank Year 2000 (Devlin) statement
Think gold is cheap after reading all these documents from www.house.gov/banking :-)
house.gov
Excerpts:
The Year 2000 problem has not generated the same sense of urgency in the banking industry outside the US. In some geographies, other issues are competing for resources and attention; for example: Europe is focused on the impact of the EMU; Japan is pre-occupied with the "big bang" and to some extent, the EMU. In Latin America, there has been a tendency to compare Year 2000 remediation to the currency changes with which they are familiar. Some governments do not appear to believe that remediation will be a major effort. Unlike the US, banking industry action in other countries is being primarily driven by ABA-like industry associations instead of banking regulators. [...]
Banks (and regulators) are doing extensive testing of vendor products but have been reluctant to share specific information because of the fear of potential litigation. Even among groups like the New York Clearing House, information sharing is largely limited to anecdotal, verbal exchanges. Potentially helpful in this area would be legislation protecting from liability damages those financial institutions which cooperate in industry-wide sharing of Year 2000 information under specified parameters. [...] Telecommunications vendors were late in getting started on their remediation efforts and have sometimes provided incorrect information due to the immaturity of their own programs. [...]
Finally, we are preparing for necessary "triage" activities on and after January 1, 2000: technology "SWAT" teams will be deployed at each of our processing centers to respond immediately to emergent problems; our business units are reviewing existing contingency plans (for example, BC-177 preparations) to enable them to continue operations in the event of process disruptions.
Citibank believes that each banking organization can, and will, address these contingency issues. But there is little that a single organization can do against systemic failures within, or external to, the banking industry. The issue then becomes not contingency planning but disaster recovery planning. Again, groups like the New York Clearing House Year 2000 Committee are beginning to address this topic. But regulatory leadership may be required in this arena. [...] |
