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IBM intros first suite of tools from Watson Financial Services

The Watson-powered software tools stem from IBM's acquisition of Promontory Financial Group in 2016.
Written by Natalie Gagliordi, Contributor
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Image: IBM

IBM has released the first suite of services under the newly formed Watson Financial Services division.

The industry-specific Watson unit stems from IBM's acquisition of Promontory Financial Group in 2016. Promontory was a global consulting operation with an aim of helping banks manage the ever-increasing regulation and risk management requirements in the financial sector.

IBM has since leveraged the industry expertise of Promontory's workforce -- made up of ex-regulators and banking executives -- to teach Watson all about regulation, risk, and compliance. The first batch cognitive tools covers three areas: Regulatory requirements, financial crime insights, and financial risk modeling. The Watson-powered software is available today via the IBM Cloud.

As for Watson Regulatory Compliance, IBM said it has started the process of feeding regulations from 200 different sources into Watson's AI platform in order to expand the system's capabilities for compliance professionals.

"Two generations ago, IBM brought the first computers to the financial services sector, allowing banks and other institutions to foster greater trust in the market by operating more efficiently and accurately," said Bridget van Kralingen, SVP of IBM Industry Platforms.

"To foster trust today, financial institutions must analyze an industry's worth of information to monitor risk and compliance. No individual - or team of them - can adequately do this alone, and so once again, IBM is bringing a new type of computing - cognitive computing - to help these professionals operate more effectively," she added.

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