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The New Risks in Risk Regulation

The received wisdom among financial regulators is that they are better off being able to say, “We told you so” if something goes wrong, and that there is little downside in occasionally issuing dark warnings. So should we be genuinely anxious about a spate of recent warnings from central banks and international financial institutions?

LONDON – When I took over responsibility for banking supervision in the United Kingdom, in 1995, a wise old bird in the Bank of England (BoE) warned me that I would find it a thankless task. No newspaper ever prints a headline reading “All London Banks Safe and Sound this Week.” But if a problem occurs, it is almost invariably seen as a case of supervisory failure. Dozy watchdogs asleep at the wheel are a trope that trips quickly into journalists’ coverage.

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