Financial regulators and supervisors around the world are on a crusade to avert any re-run of the crisis that crippled the global economy last year. Recently, the issue of banks' liquidity has crept up the authorities' agenda.
In October, the UK's Financial Services Authority introduced rules to increase the resilience of banks to liquidity crunches. These regulations, which conform to guidelines laid down by the Committee of European Banking Supervisors, aim to raise the quantity and quality of liquidity buffers by forcing banks to hold significant amounts of “high-quality” government bonds.
Other members of the CEBS have followed the FSA's example and more are expected to do so during 2010. Should that happen, further countries, including the US, will be compelled to emulate the FSA standard, making it global. This sounds like good news, in that the new liquidity framework has to be pervasive to stand any chance of succeeding. But such ubiquity will also amplify any adverse side-effects.