Johnson Kong
Managing Director – Non Assurance
Hong Kong is an international financial centre. Most international financial institutions have presence in Hong Kong. Innovative mid-tier financial firms are also growing its business in the region and in China. Leveraging our presence in Hong Kong, we can assist our financial services clients including banks, asset managers, securities firms and insurance companies to develop their businesses in Hong Kong for their regional businesses.
We provide a wide range of services to our financial services clients including:
- Internal audit
- Special internal control review required by regulators
- Third party assurance on service organisation controls
- Anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing advisory
Internal audit
We provide internal audit services for adding values to your organisation. Practices of risk management and internal controls determine the long term success of an organisation. Our internal audit service aims to bring innovative ideas and act as a critical sounding board to senior management and the board room to achieve your goals.
We design and deliver tailored internal audit services – from conducting a detailed risk assessment, to creating strategic internal audit programmes, to reporting findings to management, the board, and other stakeholders (eg regulators). Not only will we identify issues, we will also work alongside the management on solutions and appropriate controls to be in place.
Our ultimate goal is to create a tailored framework for our clients, which helps address their needs and achieve their goals. To make this happen we work closely with them to create the right internal audit solution. Our internal audit services include:
- Internal audit outsourcing
- Internal audit co-sourcing
- Quality assurance review on internal audit function
We can provide internal audit services to banks, securities firms, stored value facility licensees and other financial services clients and can certainly help you address your own needs in your internal audit function.
Special internal control review required by regulators
Many financial institutions are regulated by regulators in Hong Kong and overseas. We help different financial institutions enhance their internal controls system at the requests of their regulators.
In Hong Kong, banks are regulated by the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) and registered under the Banking Ordinance of Hong Kong. The HKMA may request a bank to commission a review on its risk governance framework and internal control system on treasury operations, credit risk management system, anti-money laundering processes among others. The regulator of securities firms in Hong Kong, the Securities and Futures Commission (SFC) may also request licensed corporations to review some specific regulated activities.
We helped different institutions enhance their internal control systems on governance structure, processes for credit risk management, statutory return submission, AML/CFT, margin financing, securities trading system among others to address the requests of their regulators. If you have concerns over practices of your institution on compliance of regulations or requests from regulators on special reviews, please do not hesitate to contact our advisors in the risk advisory team.
Third party assurance on service organisation controls
Today businesses face ever-shifting business practices and regulatory environment. A trusted service auditor to provide assurance on business and operational processes of a financial institution is usually necessary if not essential. At BDO, our third party assurance services on service organisation controls (SOC) can help your customers (and also their auditors) to build trust on your processes. Our team is dedicated to providing high quality assurance services to our clients. We provide fair and balanced assessments, and support your organisation to demonstrate its well designed and effective controls.
After gaining a deep understanding of our clients' organisations, we deliver assurance services tailored for our clients to achieve their control objectives for different processes. We usually apply international assurance standards, namely International Standard on Assurance Engagements 3402 (ISAE 3402) , Assurance Reports on Controls at a Service Organization, together with other professional standards and framework if necessary to address our clients' needs.
If your client asks you for a third party assurance (eg ISAE 3402/SOC) report or you would like to have a third party assurance on your business or operational processes, please talk to us. We will provide an efficient and tailored solution for your need.
Anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing advisory
The Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing (Financial Institutions) Ordinance has come into effect on 1 April 2012. Since then, the anti-money laundering and counter financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) risks continue to be a major concern for regulators in Hong Kong. Several authorised institutions and licensed corporations were publicly reprimanded and fined due to deficiencies found in their AML/CFT control frameworks. Increasing numbers of financial institutions now understand that the effective money laundering/terrorist financing (ML/TF) risk management is essential for safeguarding their reputation, customer interest as well as business growth and innovation.
Our BDO Risk Advisory Services team are experienced in providing AML/CFT support to numerous authorised institutions, licensed corporations and store valued facilities licensees. We aim to assist our clients in meeting the regulatory requirements and provide advisory services in the following key areas of AML/CFT:
- Management oversight
- Institutional ML/TF risk assessment
- Customer ML/TF risk assessment model and classification
- Customer due diligence
- Screening
- Transaction monitoring and suspicious transactions reporting (STR)
- Trade based money laundering advisory
- Staff training, policies and procedures
Related brochures:
Anti-Money Laundering and Counter-Terrorist Financing Advisory
BDO Risk Advisory Services - Financial Services
Related publications:
Mitigating AML compliance challenges
Financial Services Sector Updates - Issue 4/2022
