FTT Lending 2026 Recap: Risk, regulation and resilience in Lending Draft

Rob Cox, Chief Product and Customer Officer, LendingMetrics, spoke on a panel at the recent FTT Lending London 2026, read his latest perspectives following this enthralling event.

Last week, at FTT Lending London 2026, a consistent theme emerged across discussions with lenders, regulators and technology providers: the way firms define and manage risk appetite is under increasing pressure.

Two questions framed the discussion. What does a healthy risk appetite look like in 2026, and how can technology strengthen trust and resilience in lending?

What stood out clearly is that risk appetite can no longer be treated as something static, defined periodically and left unchanged. Regulatory expectations continue to evolve, and with them, the need for credit policies to be continuously evidenced and refined.

Beyond simply setting policy, firms must ensure that their processes reflect it in their operations, and that any changes can be introduced with confidence and appropriate oversight, while keeping customer outcomes central.

In practice, this is where many organisations encounter friction.

Where change introduces risk

Adjusting credit policies and refining strategy inevitably introduces risk, not only to live portfolio performance, but also to governance.

In my experience, many firms remain heavily reliant on retrospective analysis to understand the impact of change. While this provides some level of assurance, it often falls short of what is now expected from both a regulatory and internal governance perspective. In practice, this creates a gap between intention and evidence, where firms believe they are managing risk effectively, but cannot always demonstrate it with sufficient rigour.

The ability to clearly evidence why a decision was made, how a change was tested, and what its expected impact may be is becoming increasingly important in the context of FCA expectations and Consumer Duty.

What this highlights is a broader shift in how resilience in lending is defined. It is no longer simply about building robust models or applying advanced analytics. It is about creating an environment in which change can be introduced safely, observed transparently, and governed effectively.

A more controlled approach to change

This is where a more controlled approach to change becomes critical.

At LendingMetrics, we are seeing increasing demand for the ability to test revised decisioning strategies in parallel with existing logic, without impacting live customer outcomes. This allows lenders to move beyond assumption and retrospective review, towards a more evidence-led approach to decisioning.

In practical terms, this allows firms to

• See how changes would perform in real time
• Identify sensitivities across decisioning logic
• Understand any unintended consequences before moving into production

The value is not simply better analysis, it is stronger governance.

Redefining risk appetite

With controlled, non-live testing, firms can support decisions with clear, auditable evidence, aligned to internal and regulatory expectations.

In this context, a healthy risk appetite is no longer defined solely by thresholds or policy statements. It is defined by how well that appetite is understood, how frequently it is validated, and how confidently it can be adjusted in response to change.

Too often, the challenge is not in setting strategy, but in executing change safely and with sufficient oversight. This is where risk is increasingly introduced, rather than managed.

Confidence through controlled decisioning

Technology is central to enabling this, but its value lies in transparency, control and accountability in decisioning. Resilience in lending is no longer defined by the strength of a model, but by how safely and confidently change can be introduced.