Keys Factors in Quality financial translation

Financial translation is important for foreign banks, insurance companies and financial institutions looking to do business in local markets. While the need for financial translation is often driven by regulatory requirements, it also aims to build trust with target clients and deepen relationships with customers.

As financial institutions continue to expand globally, the ability to communicate and make business information available in the local language becomes more vital than ever. As a result, the demand for fast but accurate translation increases correspondingly.

Due to syntax and flow of financial text, financial translation remains one of the most challenging types of translation. Financial translators need expertise and years of experience, not to mention in-depth knowledge of specific concepts in the industry.

While financial translation is a challenging type of translation, best practices can help professional translators maintain high quality of service:

1. Glossary, glossary, glossary

Glossary is perhaps the single most important aspect when it comes to financial translation. Without saying company, institution, people, product, and service names need to be translated without error. However, simple words such as "income", "profit", "corporate announcement" etc. often also have multiple corresponding translations in the target language based on the context. Translators must always confirm with clients their preference of translating financial terms, no matter how simple and common they may seem.

2. Consistency

Consistency is vital for translation of recurring financial documents. Financial institutions often publish recurring information. It is important that the translation style and terminology stays consistent each time per publication or document/article type. Using some form of translation memory or glossary management system is often the way to go for maintaining consistency.

3. Check with the authority

In certain jurisdiction, the regulators and government bodies would publish official translation for certain terms and phrases. For instance, the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong would publish glossaries for financial terms in Chinese and English, and the Securities and Futures Commission in Hong Kong would publish bilingual Codes and Guidelines that have the force of law. It is important for translators to check with these authority sources, and decide whether he or she would like to deviate from the official translation guidelines and styles.

4. Make the most of translation technology

Financial translation is often pressed for time, and the delivery would be required in a short span of time. Translation technology can make a huge impact on financial translation, helping translators complete projects more quickly while improving quality and consistency.

Some of these technology tools include computer aided translation tools (CAT tools) which typically allow translators to employ translation memory and statistical methods to help the translator improve the efficiency and management of their work. The newer and more current translation tools include using neural technology which is what most people refer to as artificial intelligence (AI) today. These neural translation tools tend to perform much better and are more accurate than their older statistical versions (e.g detecting names or corresponding words in a sentence.) One important and more improved feature of neural translation tools is machine translation. Statistical methods in the past didn't produce very good machines translators (remember Google Translate 10-15 years ago?), neural network technology has allowed for a much bigger improvement in recent years where machine translation is bordering human level for certain sentences and phrases.

Adapting the above practices go a long way in ensuring the quality of translation and avoiding errors and inconsistencies that often plague financial translation.