Committee Structures

Overview of South African financial stability coordination structures

Although the FSR Act assigns the main legal responsibility for preserving financial stability to the SARB, it also recognises the fact that it is not a mandate that can be achieved by one authority alone. The broad scope of the financial stability mandate requires a high degree of interagency coordination and cooperation. The FSR Act makes provision for such interaction through the establishment of the FSOC and the FSCF. In addition, the SARB has established an internal, non-statutory committee − the FSC – to facilitate cooperation among its various line functions in the execution of its financial stability mandate. The composition and functions of these three coordination structures are set out below:

Description and objectives

The FSC is an internal non-statutory policy committee of the SARB.
The purpose of the FSC is to formulate financial stability policy of the SARB in support of its financial stability mandate.
The FSC currently meets four times a year, but the Governor can convene a meeting at any time if required.

Membership composition

The FSC consists of:

the Governor as Chairperson;
the SARB deputy governors; and
the heads of the SARB’s line departments.^{^[1]}

Functions

Through the FSC, the SARB fulfils its responsibility to monitor and review the strengths and weaknesses of the financial system and any risks to financial stability, and take the necessary steps to mitigate these risks.
The FSC monitors global and domestic financial vulnerabilities, considers their possible implications for domestic financial stability, and decides whether any mitigating measures need to be taken.
The FSC oversees the work of two subcommittees:
- the Resolution Policy Panel, which develops resolution planning and crisis management policies; and
- the Crisis Preparedness Committee (CPC), which compiles and coordinates the SARB’ contingency plans should a systemic event occur.

_{[1] These are the Financial Stability Department; the four departments comprising the Prudential Authority, the Financial Markets Department, the Financial Surveillance Department, the National Payment System Department, the Economic Statistics Department and the Economic Research Department.}

Description and Objectives

The FSOC was established on 1 April 2018 as a statutory committee in terms of the FSR Act.
The primary objectives of the committee are to (i) support the SARB when it performs its functions in relation to financial stability; and (ii) facilitate cooperation and collaboration between the SARB and other financial sector regulators.
The FSOC meets regularly twice a year, but the Governor may convene a meeting of the FSOC at any time when deemed necessary, and must convene a meeting if requested to do so by any one of the financial sector regulators.

Membership composition

The FSOC consists of:

the Governor as Chairperson;
the Deputy Governor responsible for financial stability matters;
the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Prudential Authority;
the Commissioner of the FSCA;
the CEO of the National Credit Regulator (NCR),
the Director-General of National Treasury,
the Director of the Financial Intelligence Centre (FIC); and
up to three additional officials of the SARB appointed by the Governor (currently the Head of the Financial Markets Department, Head of the National Payment System Department and Head of the Financial Surveillance Department).

Functions

Serve as a forum for SARB representatives and financial sector regulators to be informed, and to exchange views on issues surrounding financial stability.
Make recommendations to the Governor on the designation of systemically important financial institutions.
Advise the Minister of Finance and the SARB on (i) steps to be taken to promote, protect or maintain, or to manage or prevent risks to, financial stability; and (ii) matters relating to crisis management and prevention.
Make recommendations to other organs of state regarding steps that are appropriate for them to take to promote financial stability and mitigating risks to financial stability.

Description and objectives

The FSCF was established as an informal industry body in 2002 and elevated to a statutory committee in the FSR Act in 2017 to ensure broad participation and engagement of stakeholder groups in defining and coordinating approaches to crisis management.
While the FSOC members include only the regulatory agencies, the FSCF members include industry representatives from across the financial sector.
The FSCF’s primary objective is to assist the FSOC with the identification of risks that could result in potential systemic events; and the coordination of appropriate plans, mechanisms and structures to mitigate those risks.
It fulfils its objective by facilitating cross-sectoral cooperation in the identification of potential threats to thestability of the South African financial sector.

Membership composition

The FSCF is chaired by the SARB Deputy Governor responsible for financial stability.
The FSCF is comprised of representatives of the SARB, financial sector regulators, financial sector industry associations and organs of state.
There are currently 17 FSCF member organisations.

Functions

Through the establishment of a coordinated network of contingency planning contacts throughout the financial services industry, the FSCF functions as a conduit for dealing with tactical situations that have the potential to affect multiple organisations across the ecosystem at any given time.
The FSCF does not play an active role in managing systemic events, but rather supports the development and testing of contingency plans and works as an established network for coordinating interventions and communicating effectively during a systemic event.
The FSCF has two subcommittees, namely:
- the Operational Risk Subcommittee (ORS), which develops contingency measures for events that could severely disrupt operational continuity in the financial sector; and
- the Financial Sector Cyber Resilience Subcommittee (CRS), which focuses on industrywide efforts to increase the resilience of the financial sector to cyberattacks.

Lessons from the Covid-19 pandemic in South Africa

In the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Financial Sector Contingency Forum (FSCF) commissioned a research study to better understand how the pandemic has affected FSCF members and their operations. The work culminated in the publication of a report titled “Building an inventory of lessons learnt from the COVID-19 pandemic”, which aims to formally capture the key learnings from FSCF members’ responses to the COVID-19 pandemic should a similar event occur in the future. Click here for more.