News

Webinar on discontinuation of LIBOR

Practical consideration & Transition experiences

On 7 September, Zanders hosted an interactive webinar on the IBOR reform topic ‘Discontinuation of LIBOR- Practical Consideration & Transition Experiences’. During this session, Zanders shared latest market updates and information related to this reform and then continued with a panel discussion. Edel Hough (Head of Corporate Finance at BAT), Urszula Chwala (Treasury Manager at LyondellBasell Industries) and Arthur Leijgraaff (Senior Treasury Officer at FMO) shared their approaches, issues, considerations and achievements with regards to the LIBOR reform.

The main conclusions of our webinar are:

• The uncertainty over new alternative reference rates that would be adopted as new market standard and the uncertainty about market conventions add to the complexity of IBOR reform projects.
• Term SONIA and Term SOFR rates are established, however, regulators restrict the use of Term SONIA.
• There is still a lot of uncertainty around alternative USD reference rates as the market is trending towards a multi-rate approach, which provides flexibility but at the same time hampers establishment of significant liquidity in any single rate.
• Market conventions for the use of overnight risk-free rates differ for derivatives and cash products.
• It is essential to have companywide engagement in the IBOR reform project and focus on flexible approach and solutions.
• It is equally important to engage with external stakeholders such as auditors and banks.

To watch the full recording of this webinar, please continue here »