Financial Conduct Authority dare go after the Great Financial Distorters, your hubristic bank regulating colleagues

Sir, Madison Marriage, Peter Smith and Caroline Binham, reporting on the Financial Conduct Authority’s FCA work on investment managers write that: “tougher measures come as regulators and policymakers are turning their attention from banks to other parts of the financial system that could pose future risks.” “UK financial regulator lifts bar to create one of the toughest investment regimes” June 29.

Yes, but the part of the financial system that poses the most important current and future risks, are the regulators who with their risk-weighted capital requirements for banks, horribly distort the vital allocation of bank credit to the real economy.

Come on FCA, don’t waste time on the small guys, dare go after the big ones, even if they are your colleagues.

PS. FCA, suppose ALL Investment Managers behaved exactly they are supposed to do: Would that create less inequality? Would that represent more or less of a systemic risk?

PS. FCA, how can you help us have the wealthy 1% fall into the hands of really lousy investment managers, so as to fight inequality? :-)

@PerKurowski

The UK’s Financial Conduct Authority has got to be kidding, or it is just too dumb. Your choice Sir?

Sir, Caroline Binham writes: “Britain’s financial watchdog is clamping down on investment banks’ “misrepresentation” and league table inflation as part of efforts to stamp out conflicts of interest to ensure clients, particularly small companies, get a fair deal.” “UK regulator clamps down on banks’ moves to manipulate league tables” October 19.

It sounds important and seems correct, but also like a very bad joke. Here is “Britain’s financial watchdog”, one that gladly allows risk weighted capital requirements to be imposed on banks; that which curtails the access to bank credit of small companies, now coming out as a champion for the SMEs. It has got to be kidding, or it has to be dumb. Your choice Sir?

@PerKurowski ©

Culture might not be a matter for bank regulators, but common sense should be.

Sir, you write “Banks are ultimately private institutions and not adjuncts of the state. It is the job of the FCA both to ensure that they treat their customers fairly and also to preserve the integrity of the UK’s financial markets. It is not the regulator’s function to determine how they go about the day-to-day management of their businesses. The soundness of the country’s financial system ultimately depends on having a sensible framework of well enforced rules as well as institutions that are capitalised sufficiently to withstand inevitable periodic shocks.” “Culture is a matter for banks not regulators” January 13.

Indeed but what have the regulators done? Nothing less than giving the banks the incentives that allow these to earn much higher risk adjusted returns on equity when lending to those ex ante perceived or deemed as safe, like the AAArisktocracy or Infallible Sovereigns, than when lending to those ex ante perceived as risky, like SMEs and entrepreneurs.

And that they did by means of credit risk weighted capital (equity) requirements, more risk more capital – less risk less capital; which means banks can leverage more with assets perceived as “safe” than with assets perceived as “risky”. 

Basel II prescribed 1.6 percent in capital for what was AAA rated, and 12 percent for what was rated below BB-. The meaning of that is “be very scared of the risks you see, what’s below BB-, and very daring with those you don’t see, the AAAs”

And with that regulators guaranteed that when really bad things happen, like when an AAA rated assets turned out ex post to be very risky, banks would stand there with especially little capital to cover themselves up with.

And with that they regulators also guaranteed the weakening of the real economy, that economy for which risk taking is the oxygen that helps it to move forward so as not to stall and fall.

Frankly, in their current incarnations, we would all be better off if the Basel Committee, the Financial Stability Board, the FCA, and other similar meddling schemers simply did not exist.

Sir, and you should be ashamed of helping to cover up those bad regulations that are taking our economies down.

Bank fines should be paid with bank equity, not with cash, unless we are masochists and want to be cruel to the economy.

Increasing the capital requirements for banks in the midst of a slow economy, while at the same time eroding bank capital with fines, is sheer economic cruelty… pure masochism. And especially so against those who for which cruel regulators decided, for no other reason that they think that to be a great idea to keep banks safe, that banks need to hold especially much capital when lending to them, like the SMEs and the entrepreneurs.

Sir, with respect to the reimbursement of claims for mis-sold insurance, you write that “As of this year, banks have already paid out about £20bn” and at long last take notice of that “The consequent erosion of banking equity can hinder credit provision in ways that damage the economy as much as the stimulus has helped” “UK banking’s sorry tale draws slowly to a close” October 3.

At long last FT! £20bn times a prudent level of 12 to 1 leverage gives you £240bn less lending capacity… at current imprudent sort of 30 to 1 leverage that would signify £600bn less lending capacity.

I hold “At long last FT!” because I have written you several letters on this problem but that, as usual, for your own internal reasons decided to ignore.

But I repeat. We must find a new way of imposing fines on banks. I have suggested that instead of cash banks pay in new shares issued at current market value. These shares if paid to the State could be non-voting and if paid to persons, like in this case, could include preferred dividends for some years.

PS. Having those mistreated by banks become their shareholders, seems like a innovative way of educating banks  J 

PS. Allowing authorities decide at each moment in what proportion of cash or equity these fines should be paid, would give them a new countercyclical tool  J

PS. The payment in bank shares should apply, of course, to all legal fees too J

PS. How come so many that loudly complain about government austerity loudly support bank credit austerity… do they all carry the virus of statism in their hearts? L

@PerKurowski

FCA, if there are “high interest rules” should there not be “low interest rate rules” too?

Sir, I refer to your “High interest rules”, October 4.

When reading about the laudable efforts of Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) of trying to reign in the excesses of payday lenders, one can also wonder about when the FCA would tackle the other side of the coin; namely the absurd low interest government pays on its debt and which might even be the reason for why many savers might end up having to reach out for moneylenders.

Let us not ignore that besides awful money lenders who could break your kneecaps, there are also awful money borrowers too, even though these use more subtle methods. Like for instance the borrowing public sector, who have the regulators allowing the banks to lend to it holding no capital, while simultaneously requiring the banks to hold about 8 percent in capital when lending to any ordinary citizen.

The best help Britain’s Financial Conduct Authority can give on payday lending is to diminish the need for payday borrowings.

Sir, in “Payday lending”, December 7, you refer to Britain’s new Financial Conduct Authority to be given powers to cap the cost and duration of loans that target the low-paid and vulnerable. 

But the truth is that in terms of the accumulated amounts of excessive interest all vulnerable have to pay, nothing beats what the normal bank borrowers perceived as “The Risky” need to pay in extra interests to the banks, just in order to make up for the fact that bank regulators, for no particular good reason at all, allow banks to hold less capital when lending to “The Infallible”. 

If these regulatory discrimination which make access to bank credit so much scarcer and onerous that they would ordinary be for ‘The Risky”, those which includes small businesses and entrepreneurs, is eliminated, then they would perhaps not be so much need for payday loans. 

In July 2012 I registered a complaint on this with the Financial Ombudsman Service in UK, so I guess I might need to re-register it with the Financial Conduct Authority.