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Working Paper
COVID-19 as a Stress Test: Assessing the Bank Regulatory Framework
The widespread economic damage caused by the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic poses the first major test of the bank regulatory reforms put in place following the global financial crisis. This study assesses this framework, with an emphasis on capital and liquidity requirements. Leading up to the COVID-19 crisis, banks were well-capitalized and held ample liquid assets, reflecting in part heightened requirements. Capital requirements were comparable across major jurisdictions, despite differences in the implementation of the international Basel standards. The overall robust capital and liquidity ...
Working Paper
A Brief History of the U.S. Regulatory Perimeter
This paper provides a brief history of the U.S. financial regulatory perimeter, a legal cordon comprised of “positive†and “negative†restrictions on the conduct of banking organizations. Today’s regulatory perimeter faces a wide range of challenges, from disaggregation, to new commercial entrants, to new varieties of charters (and new uses of legacy charters). We situate these challenges in the longer history of American banking, identifying a pattern in debates about the nature, shape, and position of the perimeter: outside-in pressure, inside-out pressure, and ...
Discussion Paper
Worker Flows in Banking Regulation
In the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, job transitions of personnel in banking supervision and regulation between the public and private sectors?often labeled the revolving door?have come under intense scrutiny and have been blamed by certain economists (Johnson and Kwak), legal scholars (John Coffee in the Financial Times), and policymakers (Dodd-Frank Act of 2010, Section 968) for distorting regulators? actions in favor of banks. However, other commentators have downplayed these distortions and presented a more benign viewpoint of these worker flows?as a means for regulatory ...