Banks Must Pay for Financial Crisis

Leaders at this week’s G7 meeting have agreed that banks must shoulder some of the cost of the financial crisis, but not on a method for enforcing this policy, an anonymous German official told Reuters. "There is a consensus that banks themselves have to contribute to pay for the financial burden of the crisis," he said, as Britain announced its plans for a 50 percent levy on major bank bonuses. On his part, President Obama has proposed new regulations requiring lenders to keep a certain percentage of loans they securitize on the books at all times, called by many a “skin-the-game” rule. The most viable international proposal seems to have come from Canada, which managed to avoid bank bailouts, even at the height of the crisis. “Canada has made a proposal, in which three points have been lined out, and which were supported. The first issue is that of capital rules,” said the official. “The second is to recreate a transparent securitization market. And the third is the sector of market infrastructure especially for derivatives.” G7 officials have also been invited by Germany’s finance minister to an upcoming Berlin meeting on financial regulation.