The United States Treasury and the World Bank have successfully co-hosted the International Retail Debt Management Symposium on October 20th, 2020. The Symposium is sponsored by the International Retail Debt Management Conference (IRDMC) core countries and held biennially. The core IRDMC membership includes Brazil, Canada, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

This year’s Symposium brought together 19 countries with seasoned retail programs and those looking to establish or review existing programs. The Symposium provided a forum for debt managers to discuss current issues and trends such as product development, distribution channels, market research, and the use of new technology.

This year’s topics included (i) the impact of the COVID 19-crisis on retail debt programs; (ii) recent and future developments in retail debt programs; (iii) starting a retail debt program: the do’s and don’ts.

The 2020 edition of the Symposium was organized by the Finance, Competitiveness & Innovation Global Practice in collaboration with the Macroeconomics, Trade & Investment Global Practice. It was held virtually.