Latest Blog Articles

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Stay up-to-date by reading useful articles from industry thought leaders who tackle common challenges and discuss current or proposed industry regulations.

  • What Is Compliance Risk? A Guide for Financial Organizations

    4 days ago
    Regulatory uncertainty. Lean teams. A compliance landscape that keeps changing. Financial organizations are navigating all of it — and the ones that come out ahead treat compliance as a strategic function. That starts with understanding compliance risk: what it is, where it comes from, and what's at stake when it goes unmanaged. This post covers common sources of compliance risk, what a strong compliance management program looks like, and how leadership sets a tone that can make or break your program.

  • Ncontracts Publishes New Book, The Upside of Third-Party Risk Management

    7 days ago
    NASHVILLE, Tenn., June 22, 2026 – Ncontracts, the leading provider of integrated compliance, risk, and vendor management solutions to the financial industry, today announced the release of The Upside of Third-Party Risk Management: The Practitioner's Guide to Turning Vendor Risk into Strategic Value, the third book in the company's Upside Series: Strategic Success for Financial Institutions. Co-authored by risk management veteran Michael Carpenter and Ncontracts founder and CEO Michael Berman, the book builds on the series' core premise that compliance and risk functions are strategic assets, not administrative burdens. Written for real-world practitioners, the guide provides actionable frameworks they can use to protect their organization from operational disruption and create a measurable competitive advantage. "Most organizations already have vendor management programs in place," said Carpenter. "What this book addresses is the gap between a program that satisfies requirements and one that actually reduces exposure and improves operational performance." The book walks through the vendor management lifecycle end to end, from strategy and risk appetite to due diligence, contracting, and performance monitoring. A central theme is ecosystem thinking, recognizing that vendors don't operate in isolation, and that risk accumulates across integrations, dependencies, and shared systems in ways that traditional oversight approaches often miss. "Effective third-party risk management isn't dictated by the size of your institution or how long you've had a program," said Berman. "It's about whether your program is connected to how the business operates. This book provides the roadmap to make that connection — wherever you're starting from.”

  • How AI Is Changing the Compliance Officer’s Role

    10 days ago
    For most compliance officers, the job has always taken on the same shape: something happens, you respond. A regulation changes, you update your policies. An examiner asks a question, you pull documentation. Front line makes an error, you retrain. You're always catching up, rarely getting ahead. Artificial intelligence (AI) is changing that, not just by making compliance work faster, but by enabling compliance officers to operate more strategically and shape decisions before they're made.

  • June 2026 Vendor Management News | Ncontracts

    11 days ago
    Stay up to date on the latest vendor risk management news happening this month. Check out the articles below.

  • Emerging Risks in Banking: Q2 2026 Update

    13 days ago
    The compliance landscape in 2026 is shifting in two directions at once. Federal regulators are pulling back, but state enforcement, private litigation, and operational complexity are accelerating. For compliance and risk professionals at financial organizations, that tension is the defining challenge of the year. This update covers six developments shaping the risk environment right now: deregulation and fair lending in flux, rising consumer complaints as a supervisory signal, AI risk across governance and cybersecurity, evolving state regulations, AI in third-party risk management, and Nacha ACH fraud monitoring deadlines already in motion. Keeping up with federal and state regulations takes more than a good reading list. Have complex questions that need answers? Nquiry delivers cited, auditable answers to regulatory questions in minutes.

  • Enforcement Actions Roundup: May 2026 | Ncontracts

    18 days ago
    Welcome to the latest Enforcement Actions Roundup covering May’s enforcement actions. Every month, our team of regulatory compliance experts breaks down what went wrong, why it matters, and what your financial organization can do to stay ahead. This roundup features two key resources:  

  • June 2026 Regulatory Update: Fair Lending Shifts & a Supervisory Reset

    19 days ago
    Federal regulators are moving on several fronts this month. Executive orders are reshaping BSA/AML and lending obligations, federal agencies are asserting preemption over state interchange and escrow laws, and the OCC, FRB, and FFIEC are each recalibrating supervisory expectations while courts work through several of these questions in parallel. Want a deeper dive into the latest headlines? Watch the June Reg Update podcast. For additional resources and regulatory analyses, check your Ncomply solution .

  • Top Insights from the 2026 TPRM Survey | Ncontracts

    25 days ago
    Financial organizations are under pressure. Vendor portfolios are growing, budgets are flat, and AI is introducing risk they aren’t yet equipped to manage. In fact, not a single financial institution (FI) surveyed in the 2026 State of Third-Party Risk Management Survey feels extremely confident managing AI-related vendor risk. Ncontracts' annual look at how banks, credit unions, mortgage companies, and other financial services organizations manage vendor oversight draws on responses from financial services professionals across organizations ranging from under $250 million to over $10 billion in assets. Whether you work in risk, compliance, or vendor management, the data offers insights into how your peers are approaching third-party risk management and where gaps remain. Here are the highlights.

  • Ncontracts Names Dr. Maureen Schumacher Chief Marketing Officer

    25 days ago
    NASHVILLE, Tenn., June 4, 2026 – Financial organizations are navigating a risk landscape that grows more complex by the day. Ncontracts, the leading provider of integrated compliance, risk, and vendor management solutions to the financial industry, is moving to meet that moment, today announcing the appointment of Dr. Maureen Schumacher as Chief Marketing Officer. Schumacher brings more than three decades of marketing leadership across financial services, payments, and enterprise technology. Her career spans Smarsh, Global Payments, Google and GE, building brand and revenue programs across the U.S., Europe, and Asia and establishing a consistent record of translating complex technology into market-moving strategies. “Risk management and compliance is one of the most consequential challenges financial organizations face, and Ncontracts is solving it in a way that is genuinely differentiated,” said Schumacher. “The combination of deep regulatory expertise, proprietary data, and responsible AI creates a compelling solution, and I am excited to help financial organizations understand how this technology can transform the way they manage risk.” "Maureen brings exactly the marketing leadership we need at this stage of our growth," said Michael Berman, CEO at Ncontracts. "She has spent her career translating complex technology into market-moving strategies in competitive, fast-moving industries — and that is precisely what this moment calls for as we bring our AI-powered compliance, vendor, and risk management platform to the financial services industry." Schumacher joins at a pivotal moment for the company. Ncontracts recently launched Nquiry Ntelligence , an AI-powered compliance intelligence technology built for the financial organizations looking to work more efficiently in an increasingly complex regulatory landscape. The company has been named to the Inc. 5000 list of fastest-growing private companies in America for seven consecutive years, and today serves more than 5,000 banks, credit unions, mortgage companies, fintechs, and wealth management firms.