Let’s face it, when it comes to Twitter and financial institutions, it seems like a tool whose usefulness is limited to reminding consumers about holiday closing times and food drives.
But more and more, Twitter is becoming a helpful resource beyond reaching out to consumers. It is emerging as a useful tool for those with responsibilities for compliance and risk at their financial institutions. Some of the more savvy tweeters even manage to capture the slightly playful, terse Twitter culture in their tweets, while still maintaining their business decorum. There are even some who use the #Compliance hashtag to further build the community.
Although the Twitter compliance community appears to be still in its infancy, here are 10 (5 this week, 5 more to follow next week) worthwhile tweeters you may want to follow for matters relating to compliance and risk for financial institutions. These are in no particular order. I plan to update this list periodically, so if you have suggestions for Twitter accounts that should be added to the list, please send them my way via dennis(dot)agle(at)affirmx(dot)com.
 

ICBA

The Independent Community Bankers of America’s Twitter account is lively and informative, with about 5-8 tweets per day to their 3,500+ followers.
Recent sample tweet: 
Even w/large equity cushion, the perverse incentives of ‘too big to fail’ will assert themselves http://ow.ly/oo29f  via @FT @TimHarford
 

NAFCU

National Association of Federal Credit Union’s Twitter account isn’t just for credit unions, as they track matters of compliance relevant to all financial institutions. Fairly terse recap of items posted on their site, but a useful way to monitor their site at a glance. They tweet about 4-5 times per day to their 1,500+ followers.
Recent sample tweet: 
@NAFCU VP of Regulatory Compliance Steve Van Beek explains “culture of compliance” in @CUinsight http://ht.ly/oleW7 
 

Heidi N. Moore

Heidi is the Guardian’s U.S. finance and economics editor. Her compliance/risk tweets, as a percentage of her overall tweets, may be relatively low compared to other Twitter accounts mentioned here, but the sheer, overall volume of tweets that she manages to produce on a daily basis more than compensates. She pulls no punches and everything and everyone are fair game. There’s a reason she has 38,000+ followers.
Recent sample tweet:
RIP the housing “recovery.” Not so deep as a well, nor so wide as a church door, but the wound will do. http://blogs.marketwatch.com/capitolreport/2013/08/27/goldman-sachs-says-housing-has-hit-a-pothole/?mod=sfmw …
 

Risk InboX

Full disclosure: This account is run by those of us here at AffirmX. It is also by far the account with the least number of followers (154) on this list, and is also probably the youngest of the accounts listed. But it also happens to have the highest relevance of compliance and risk, which isn’t surprising, given that that is Risk InboX’s basic charter. This account recaps highlights from the day’s postings over at Risk InboX (http://riskinbox.com) about 4-5 times per day, but with a Twitteristic twist.
Recent sample tweet:
Need a reason to take a closer look at vendor management? Here’s half a billion. #topLINKtoday #compliance
 

CUInsight

CUInsight’s Twitter account appears to be run by its co-founder and publisher, Randy Smith, who keeps the account lively, informal and informative. One of the more active accounts, with 6-8 tweets per day to its more than 4,200 followers.
Recent sample tweet:
Oh, the Stupidity! The Fatal Error of Neglecting Your #Website – @jMarkArnold #CreditUnions http://ow.ly/onjnW