Adapting to CECL: Proactive Credit Loss Estimation for a Resilient Financial Future
The financial landscape is constantly evolving, with regulations and standards being updated to ensure better transparency and risk management. One such significant development is the introduction of the Current Expected Credit Loss (CECL) model by the Financial Accounting Standards Board (FASB). CECL solutions are now being developed to comply with this new accounting standard, which fundamentally changes how financial institutions (FIs) estimate future credit losses for various financial assets. This blog explores the impact of CECL and how it addresses the limitations of traditional methods. The Traditional Approach: Incurred Losses Model Before the advent of CECL, financial institutions primarily used the incurred losses model to account for credit losses. Under this model, losses were recognized only when it was evident that a loan was uncollectible. This method involved listing these uncollectible loans as expenses in the allowance for loan and lease losses (ALLL). Furthermo...