By Charles Goodhart
It is remarkable how powerful a well-turned phrase can be. There have been many such phrases generated in the course of this crisis, not all of them helpful, indeed in some cases misleading. Examples are: ‘Toxic assets’; ‘If a bank is too big to fail, it is too big’; and particularly relevant here: ‘Banks have become a combination of a casino and a utility.’ While I congratulate John Kay on his authorship of this last, arresting phrase, I am afraid that it is both misleading and wrong-headed. Continue reading "Narrow banking is not the answer to systemic fragility"

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