Nine months ago we at Hedgebook engaged audit firms, banks and corporates to discuss Credit Value Adjustment (CVA) and Debit Value Adjustment (DVA) as the introduction of IFRS 13 loomed. The overwhelming response was one of ignorance and/or disinterest. Either they didn’t know about it or they didn’t want to know. On my recent business trip to Europe an audit firm in France recounted a story about a get together they had with their clients to explain the requirement for CVA. The whole room burst out laughing. Adjust the financial instrument valuations for my credit worthiness – you must be kidding.
In some ways this wasn’t surprising as IFRS 13 really only began to impact corporates for their 31 December 2013 annual results, even though their half year results should have included the adjustment. Now six months down the track and the requirement to adjust for credit worthiness can’t be ignored.
Whether we like it or not the valuation of financial instruments has become more complex as the regulators are now focusing more closely on this area. In fact when we talk about valuations for financial instruments the understanding is that it includes the credit adjustment under the new standard. CVA is part of this change in focus and is here to stay. The question for corporates therefore is how do I calculate these values accurately but in a simple and cost-effective way?
Although this isn’t new for the US it is new for the rest of the world and it appears that Australia and New Zealand are leading the charge. Europe has been pre-occupied with the new regulatory changes, especially the reporting requirements under EMIR and so it is only now that it has come on their radar.
Of course CVA and DVA are not new. The banks have been adjusting for credit for a number of years but in the corporate space it is new and many have tried to over complicate the calculation. Monte-Carlo simulations might be appropriate for companies that have cross currency swaps or more exotic option hedging strategies but the vast majority of corporates globally are using vanilla products – fx forwards, options and interest rate swaps. For these instruments a simple methodology to calculate CVA is not just acceptable but also appropriate.
It appears that common sense is already coming to the fore with the current exposure method gaining common acceptance, where the discount curve is flexed to adjust for the credit worthiness of both parties. Although a more simplified method it is still not straightforward, requiring two valuations and an adjustment of the yield curves for credit margin. Not something the banks will be providing and so therefore there is the requirement to source this from someone who specialises in financial market valuations. It doesn’t need to be expensive though and there are low cost solutions available.
Given the numbers are mostly small there is a natural reluctance to pay very much for what are in some cases reasonably immaterial numbers. However the audit firms are insisting on its inclusion and rightly so – it is a requirement under the accounting standards and the materiality or immateriality needs to be proven. Of course credit conditions are benign at the moment but as we know this can change quickly and it won’t take much to make the credit adjustment more material.