aals: the corporate stake in climate change response January 4, 2017
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation , add a commentI’ll be at the AALS in San Francisco this week, participating in a panel on climate change. I.m going to be talking about climate change as a financial stability issue based on this draft paper.
useful and timely caveat from the comptroller of the currency November 30, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation , add a commentThomas Curry, in a speech at The Clearing House Annual Conference:
I am glad that our banks and the banking system are stronger today, but now is not the time to let our guard down. Those who have been in this business for more than one cycle know a downturn will come. Effective regulation and supervision will help ensure that the trough will not be so deep or so wide. Those who forget or choose to ignore the lessons of the last crisis do so at their own peril and increase the risk to all of us.
consequences of financial sector misconduct September 28, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation , add a commentJohn Chiang, California State Treasurer, announced sanctions against Wells Fargo for a period of one year from today including the suspension of investments by the Treasurer’s Office in all Wells Fargo securities, suspension of the use of Wells Fargo as a broker-dealer for purchasing of investments by his office and suspension of Wells Fargo as a managing underwriter on negotiated sales of California state bonds where the Treasurer appoints the underwriter. The letter announcing the sanctions to Wells Fargo states:
In the case of Wells Fargo, how can I continue to entrust the public’s money to an organization which has shown such little regard for the legions of Californians who have placed their financial well-being in its care? I have a responsibility as a leader in the financial marketplace to take action aimed at helping you understand that integrity and trust matter.
Meanwhile the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority published a raft of consultation and other documents collected together under the rubric “new measures to maintain firms’ focus on culture”, including a Policy Statement on regulatory references, a Consultation Paper on Duty of Responsibility, a Consultation Paper on non-executive directors, a Discussion Paper on the legal function, a Consultation Paper on whistleblowing in foreign branches and a Consultation Paper on remuneration in CRD IV firms. The announcement notes that the Senior Managers’ and Certification Regime has been functioning for 6 months and today’s publications give information about the Regime and move to strengthen it.
what hope of suing the troika over austerity? September 21, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : eu, financial regulation , add a commentIn an article with the title Austerity-hit citizens allowed to sue troika, ECJ rules, which discusses the implications of the decision in Ledra Advertising v Commission and ECB (Judgment) [2016] EUECJ C-8/15 (20 September 2016), Nicole Sagener writes:
Green MEP Sven Giegold said it was a “breakthrough for the protection of fundamental rights†and announced that he would endeavour to support any citizens looking to seek compensation from the troika. Giegold added that people who have been affected in countries like Greece, Portugal, Ireland and Cyprus finally have legal means by which to have their cases heard.
The article does note some caveats expressed by Andreas Fischer-Lescano: it’s not a “blank check” and will only apply in “extreme cases.”
To me the decision is another example of the Court nodding in the direction of the protection of human rights while emphasizing that they are not absolute. The Court states (in para 70, but this is not new):
restrictions may be imposed on the exercise of the right to property, provided that the restrictions genuinely meet objectives of general interest and do not constitute, in relation to the aim pursued, a disproportionate and intolerable interference, impairing the very substance of the right guaranteed
The need to protect financial stability, the Court says, is an objective of general interest for the EU:
Indeed, financial services play a central role in the economy of the European Union. Banks and credit institutions are an essential source of funding for businesses that are active in the various markets. In addition, the banks are often interconnected and certain of their number operate internationally. That is why the failure of one or more banks is liable to spread rapidly to other banks, either in the Member State concerned or in other Member States. That is liable, in turn, to produce negative spill-over effects in other sectors of the economy…In view of the objective of ensuring the stability of the banking system in the euro area, and having regard to the imminent risk of financial losses to which depositors with the two banks concerned would have been exposed if the latter had failed, such measures do not constitute a disproportionate and intolerable interference impairing the very substance of the appellants’ right to property. Consequently, they cannot be regarded as unjustified restrictions on that right.
Imagining circumstances in which EU institutions stated they needed to take urgent action to protect financial stability and the court said that the action was an unjustified interference with fundamental rights is. I think, difficult.
cambridge international symposium on economic crime (2016) – 2 September 12, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation , add a commentLots of discussions of misconduct last week, with perspectives from around the world. News stories include: proposals to make employers responsible for preventing money-laundering, false accounting and fraud in the UK (Jeremy Wright speech here), the SFO’s emphasis on genuine co-operation when considering deferred prosecution agreements, the need for global co-operation on economic crime, and arguments for new approaches to economic crime due to the failure of existing approaches.
sec announces over $100 million in whistleblower awards August 30, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation, Uncategorized , add a comment
And today the SEC announced its second largest award of $22 million.
financial stability, regulation and politics August 25, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation , add a commentI will be talking about my current draft of my financial stability paper at the University of Miami Law School next Wednesday lunchtime (August 31, 12.30-2pm).
london as an independent city state? June 21, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation, governance , add a commentMore amazing possible implications of a Brexit vote.
early draft of my new financial stability paper May 26, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation , add a commentsummer writing May 16, 2016
Posted by Bradley in : financial regulation , add a commentOver the summer I am working on a new paper on financial stability, which is a development of a paper I wrote for a book edited by Pablo Iglesias-Rodriguez, Anna Triandafyllidou & Ruby Gropas with the title The Financial Crisis and Paradigm Shift: Legal, Economic and Political Perspectives forthcoming July 2016. My chapter is Changing Perceptions of Systemic Risk in Financial Regulation. The new paper is looking at climate change and Brexit as issues of financial stability and I am taking it to Law and Society at the beginning of next month. Meanwhile I also have produced a draft of a paper on Financial Stability, Financial Services and the Single Market .