November 30, 2012

Mr. Mark Carney, what are you thinking to do about Britain, keep on making it wimpy, or making it great?

Sir, and FT’s experts and journalists, this is the letter that I would send to Mr. Carney 

Dear Mr. Carney. 

As a chairman of the Financial Stability Board, and a bank regulator, you share the responsibility for imposing on banks, capital requirement that are much lower for assets ex-ante perceived as not risky than for those perceived as risky. 

And you must of course understand this allows the banks to earn a much higher expected risk adjusted return on equity when lending to “The Infallible” than when lending to “The Risky”. 

And you must of course understand this means too much bank credit will go on too generous terms to “The Infallible”, and that “The Risky”, like all small businesses and entrepreneurs, will see their access to bank credit made much more difficult and expensive than without your intervention. 

And so, is it your intention to keep these capital requirements and have Britain little by little go wimpy, withdrawing more and more into a falsely perceived safety, like a young boy who stays in his room with his computer and never dares to walk the streets of his hometown, or are you going to put an end to this nonsense and thereby at least allow Britain the chance to remain great? 

And just in case you have not had time to think about the fundamentals lately, let me remind you of the fact that nations grow great thanks to risk-taking; and also of that all bank crisis in history have always resulted from excessive exposures to what was considered ex-ante as absolutely- not- risky, and never ever from excessive exposures to what was ex-ante seen as risky. 

By the way Mr. Carney, just out of curiosity, has a conservative government hired you to keep the capital requirements for banks when lending to the government much lower than when lending to the citizens, or, hopefully, to get rid of that odious pro-state regulation? 

Oh, and before I forget, Good Luck! 

Sincerely 

Per Kurowski 
A former Executive Director at the World Bank (2002-2004) 
Currently censored by the Financial Times