Founded in 1992 and headquartered in Edinburgh, ALMIS International empowers banks and building societies to manage, monitor, and report on their financial risk profiles. Its solutions provide executives and boards with meaningful insights into both current positions and future projections, helping them make proactive, informed decisions.
Origins: A realisation in risk
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Joe DiRollo, founder of ALMIS, was working with Price Waterhouse consultants on a project for an aircraft leasing company. The company needed to lease aircraft on long-term, fixed-rate contracts while funding itself through short-term, variable-rate deposits. There was no off-the-shelf solution to manage the interest rate risk caused by this mismatch.
This experience revealed a wider problem: effectively managing interest rate risk required complex, bespoke systems that were both costly and time-consuming. Around the same time, the UK mortgage market saw a rise in fixed-rate mortgages, while banks remained largely funded by variable-rate deposits. As interest rates climbed, profit margins were squeezed; a systemic interest rate risk challenge became apparent.
“There was a recognition of a broader market need within the banking sector,” says Luke DiRollo, now CEO of ALMIS. Joe and his team collaborated with early adopters to develop a standardised data model that banks and building societies could use to manage their sensitivity to changes in interest rates, using consistent inputs from loans, deposits, and derivatives.
Evolution through regulation and crisis
Since its founding, ALMIS has continued to adapt to the shifting demands of the financial sector. In 2005, the introduction of IAS 39 hedge accounting standards prompted ALMIS to extend its system to support compliance using the same core data and models.
Following the 2008 financial crisis, the need for standardised regulatory reporting intensified. ALMIS responded by further enhancing its platform to help clients assess risks and report to regulators efficiently.
“We are very specifically focused on the banking sector,” says Luke DiRollo. “We work with over 65 UK banks and building societies, as well as a growing number internationally, and we’ve evolved from our original offering into a platform that supports finance and treasury departments comprehensively.”
The ALMIS Technology Platform
ALMIS provides a modular, all-in-one platform tailored to the banking sector. Its Treasury Management System (TMS) handles the booking and lifecycle management of interest rate derivatives and other treasury instruments, including accruals, valuations, and limit monitoring.
A Regulatory Reporting module sits at the top of the ALMIS data warehouse, generating automated XBRL/XML reports. The suite also includes dedicated modules for Asset Liability Management (ALM) and Hedge Accounting, supporting both internal prudential risk management and external compliance.
“It’s all designed to be cloud-optimised,” says DiRollo. “But it’s also important that we support on-premise deployments, particularly in certain jurisdictions. Wherever possible, we leverage open-source technology, develop low/no-code functions, and ensure compatibility with 3rd party tools.”
Solving data complexity for banks
What problem does ALMIS solve for its customers? “In essence, we take vast, ever-evolving data across an institution’s balance sheet, including daily transactional data, and convert it into actionable insights,” says DiRollo. “This enables complex internal decision-making and simplifies external reporting.” He adds: “The real pain point is managing big data in real time. Our platform enables banks to demonstrate they’re operating within their risk appetite while ensuring consistency and efficiency in reporting to varying stakeholders.
A unique value proposition
In a crowded and competitive RegTech market, ALMIS stands out.
“We’re unique in offering the breadth of functionality we do,” explains DiRollo. “While the system is modular, most of our clients use it as a single suite. One consistent data uplift provides insights across treasury, ALM, regulatory reporting, and ad hoc finance functions.” The platform is designed to be turnkey, minimising custom development and enabling rapid onboarding. “Another key differentiator is our people. We invest heavily in training financial analysts across our domain and ensure they’re fully certified,” DiRollo adds. “We also maintain close, collaborative relationships with our clients. Their feedback has shaped every stage of our development over three decades.”
This approach creates a strong service ethos: “If you call ALMIS with a complex problem, you’ll get a meaningful answer. That’s core to our value.”
Risk in the modern financial sector
Despite the evolution of technology, the underlying financial risks remain familiar.
“There’s intense competitive pressure, squeezed interest margins, and volatile rate scenarios,” says DiRollo. “Banks need clear oversight and insight into how and where they’re making money and what their risk profiles look like.”
He also points to regulatory burden: “Post-2008, we’ve seen a wave of regulation that’s helped ensure resilience. But much of it was introduced rapidly. Now regulators are looking to refine it, making it more proportionate for smaller institutions and more consistent overall.” DiRollo notes that current frameworks often require substantial resources, diverting attention from core balance sheet management: “The overhead of standardised regulatory reporting means banks spend too much time on compliance and not enough on managing their unique risks. By integrating the two, along with other areas of bank finance, our customers recognise enormous synergies that are directly correlated with value for their institution.”
Key RegTech trends
Among the most important developments in RegTech is the move toward a single, golden source of data. “Historically, regulatory systems and internal risk systems were completely separate,” DiRollo explains. “Now, there’s a big push – especially from global regulators – to standardise data models and consolidate reporting frameworks.”
He sees this as central to ALMIS’ mission. “We support both customisable internal and standardised external reporting. Clients value this dual capability; it’s far more efficient and cost-effective than managing siloed systems.”
ALMIS in 2025 and beyond
Around five years ago, ALMIS reached what DiRollo describes as “extremely high market penetration” in its core UK segment – tier two and tier three banks. “Our focus now is scaling vertically into larger domestic institutions and horizontally into new international markets,” he says. While the business is still primarily UK-based, it now serves clients in Europe and South America and is expanding coverage to meet regulatory needs across Europe and North America.
Looking further ahead, ALMIS remains committed to its specialised focus: prudential risk, treasury, regulatory reporting, and hedge accounting for the banking sector. “We aim to expand our client base to include larger institutions in the UK and globally,” says DiRollo. “Ultimately, we want ALMIS to be the go-to platform for tier two and tier three banks worldwide.”
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