The new NYSE rules for corporate governance require the audit committee to discuss and review the firm's risk assessment and hedging strategies. They also put additional requirements for the composition and the financial knowledge of the directors sitting on the board and on the audit committee....

Credit risk is the major challenge for risk managers and market regulators. Banks, regulators and central banks do not agree on how to measure credit risk and, more particularly, on how to compute the optimal capital that is necessary for protecting the different partners that share this risk....

We take up the question of potential conflicts between the objectives of risk management policies and those connected with maximization of the firm's value. This question is a timely one, since many firms have a special committee devoted to risk management - banks and insurance companies in...