Another day another lethal financial derivative

Collateralised Debt Obligation (CDOs) and Credit Default Swap (CDS) are old hat. Say hello to the Exchange Traded Fund (ETF). The EFT  is a fund which supposedly concentrates on a discrete area of economic activity such as a the trading of a commodity, a  particular  area of business, for example, banks, or a  particular country’s [...]

All British banks are “too big to fail”

The media is alive with politicians, bankers and economic commentators saying British banks must be broken up so they are not “too big to fail”.  The Governor  of the bank of England  Mervyn  Kingof England Mervyn King was at it last week (htttp://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23927727-well-let-banks-fail-says-mervyn-king.do) and the new chief executive of Barclays, Bob Diamond, has had his say today. [...]

Why have the bankers escaped punishment?

 The fragility of the belief in laissez faire economics can be seen by the readiness of almost all of the supposedly  big bad free marketeers  to rush for the support of the State when things go wrong. As the Government almost invariably steps in when it is a bank going bust, being a  banker  is [...]