Section 348 of the Financial Services and Markets Act 2000 is what the FSA refers to when one calls to get information on most things that are of interest. Their hands are tied. Even if they are bursting to share information, they can’t. Should it be this way? Read more
On Monday night, FT Alphaville had the pleasure of chairing a discussion on “Socially Useful Banking“. The key speaker was none other than Bank of England’s executive director for financial stability, Andy Haldane. His speech was entitled “A leaf being turned“.
Since we were there for the evening, and moderating the lively Q&A, it’s been interesting to see what angles the papers have taken on it. Here-under a headline digest: Read more
Banks are lending neither to each other, nor to the real economy, in the way they used to. In Europe in particular, loan growth remains subdued. In the UK, there’s a lot of hope riding on the Funding for Lending Scheme to alleviate the situation.
While some of the great deleveraging is a question of reining in past excesses and lax standards, another part of it is regulation-driven. We have no less an authority for that than Mario Draghi, president of the European Central Bank — in the less-remarked bits of last month’s London speech: Read more
For this, our final post covering FT Alphaville’s meeting with Yves Smith of Naked Capitalism, we asked her about the regulations that have arisen from the ashes of the financial crisis. Not wanting to leave the series on a depressing note, we (gently) prodded Ms Smith to also share with us something to be optimistic about.
AV: What do you think some of the biggest pitfalls/missteps have been since the crisis in terms of regulation? Read more
EU countries led by France and Germany plan to push through controversial hedge fund regulations next week after rejecting British pleas to defer a vote in Brussels, reports the FT. The push for the new rules, opposed by the UK, sets up a bruising confrontation with David Cameron’s new government. The directive has also caused concern in the US. Tim Geithner, Treasury secretary, warned EU officials in March that, if unchanged, the new rules could trigger a transatlantic rift by unfairly locking US funds out of European markets. Read more
