About ‘TICS’ : The Tempo Issuer and Counterparty Scorecards

We are an independent plan manager (not a bank issuing its own bonds / securities / products).

We think it’s straightforward – and important – to state the obvious:


  • Issuer and counterparty risk is the most fundamental risk of a structured product.
  • Both the potential returns of a structured product and the repayment of capital usually depend upon the financial stability of the issuer / counterparty throughout the investment term.
  • Professional advisers and investors should seek to identify structured products which are backed by strong issuers / counterparties: not least as this is a regulatory requirement / expectation for professional advisers.

There are a number of metrics which are widely considered relevant in identifying and assessing the financial strength / credit risk of a prospective issuer / counterparty.

We think that the UK retail structured products sector and professional advisers have ‘upped their game’  over recent years, since the global financial crisis.

But we also think that some complacency may have crept in, over the years and that more could and should be done by the structured products sector and structured product providers to prompt professional advisers to carefully consider this critical aspect of structured products and to support them in their research and due diligence: the importance of this aspect of professional adviser research should be considered absolutely key.

Module 4 of our Professional Adviser Academy explains counterparty research, including credit ratings, credit default swaps (’CDS’)  and balance sheet fundamentals.

‘TICS’  (the Tempo Issuer and Counterparty Scorecards) provides professional advisers with access to multiple, widely recognised indicators of financial strength / credit risk, pertinent to analysing, considering and understanding issuer / counterparty financial strength / credit risk, using a robust methodology, including a scoring system, supporting best practice professional adviser issuer / counterparty research and due diligence.

Please take the time to look at the ‘TICS: Introduction and overview’  and ‘TICS: Methodology (weighting and scoring)’ presentations, which introduce and overview TICS, explain how to use TICS, also detailing what TICS is: and what TICS is not.

There is also a ‘TICS: Workshop’  video webinar recording for professional advisers.

It is necessary to register / log-in to access TICS and our Academy (you only need to register once to access both).

TICS MATERIALS FOR PROFESSIONAL ADVISERS