June 19, 2018

A major difficulty for EU is that what caused the last crisis, and attempts against its economic dynamism, shall not be named

Sir, Judy Dempsey writes that Merkel’s “conservative bloc would not buy into an agreement that would require Germany to spend more to bail out badly run economies” “Macron and Merkel will struggle to present a united front” June 19.

Have Merkel’s “conservative bloc” been told that their bank regulators assigned a risk weight of 0% to Greece and so that therefore Greece got way too much money?

Have Merkel’s “conservative bloc” been told that their regulators require banks to hold more capital against loans to German unrated entrepreneurs, than against loans to any EU sovereign?

Sir, I am sure that if central bankers and regulators were hauled in front of some really independent authority, and asked to comprehensibly explain so much of the crazy things their risk weighted capital requirements for banks entail, that would help clear the air and lead to much more constructive discussions in the EU about its future.

Who knows, perhaps such real discussions that would at long last hold some EU technocrats accountable, could even tempt a reversal of Brexit.

@PerKurowski