The Systemic Risk Council (SRC or Council) is a private sector, non-partisan body of former government officials and financial and legal experts committed to addressing regulatory and structural issues relating to global systemic risk, with a particular focus on the United States and Europe. It has been formed to provide a strong, independent voice for reforms that are necessary to protect the public from financial instability. The goal is to help ensure a financial system in which we can all have confidence.
The Council’s overriding concern stems from the slow progress being made by financial regulators, other policymakers and the financial services industry to address critical issues affecting financial stability, including reforms mandated by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, enacted in 2010.
Never again should policymakers be forced to choose between taxpayer bailouts or financial collapse. We must implement strong and simple reforms now so that our markets can function fairly and freely in good times and in bad.
That concern increases each day that the implementation of significant systemic risk reform languishes. A sense of complacency – which is only magnified by often overwhelming regulatory complexity – has made reforms for effective oversight seem less urgent despite serious and long-identified problems in the global financial system.
It is essential that policymakers show leadership through a strong and coordinated rule-writing process that promotes the development of cohesive, consistent regulations and provides clear and transparent explanations of the reforms in a way that is understandable to the general public. The Systemic Risk Council was created to assist in that effort.
Never again should policymakers be forced to choose between taxpayer bailouts or financial collapse. We must implement strong and simple reforms now so that our markets can function fairly and freely in good times and in bad.