I like this from Martin Wolf:
Yet one thing is surely now quite clear: just as war is too important to be left to generals, banking is too important to be left to bankers, however much one may like them.
His analysis is deep, and well worth reading. Any man who can say this has to be read:
It is the nature of limited liability businesses to create conflicts of interest - between management and shareholders, between management and other employees, between the business and customers and between the business and regulators. Yet the conflicts of interest created by large financial institutions are far harder to manage than in any other industry.
That is so for three fundamental reasons: first, these are virtually the only businesses able to devastate entire economies; second, in no other industry is uncertainty so pervasive; and, finally, in no other industry is it as hard for outsiders to judge the quality of decision-making, at least in the short run.
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For a more impassioned view on how badly and selfishly the banks have behaved see Jim Cramer on CNBC.
http://www.cnbc.com/id/22706231
Cramer accuses the banks of lying through their financial statements. “How can we have these levels of fiction in financials after Sarbanes-Oxley? How do people get away with this? How do they live with themselves?”
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