The level of sub-prime mortgages in Australia may be far in advance of what was previously assumed and provided for by banks. The story was broken on the ABC, and covered elsewhere. The revelations centred…
The suit lodged against Standard Chartered in Manhattan by the New York State Department of Financial Services has served its first purpose: capturing the headlines and putting the banking industry once…
Reactions to my call this week for another inquiry into Australia’s financial system have been mixed. Most commentators seem to accept that there’s logic in having another inquiry, even if some think that…
Recent news that HSBC executives admitted to allowing Iran, terrorists and drug dealers to launder nearly USD$16 billion over a six-year period would make earth underneath you shake. How is that the bank’s…
As the Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, Paul Tucker, prepares to give evidence to the Treasury Select Committee, he will be mindful of the insult thrown at Bob Diamond, the recently crestfallen…
Today Eurozone leaders will meet in Brussels. On the agenda is nothing less than the survival of the euro. Officially, it is about Spain: Spain’s economic and financial woes show the urgency. Moody’s drastically…
In a recent speech, Bank of England executive director Andy Haldane has said that peer-to-peer (P2P) lending through online sites has the potential to eventually replace old-fashioned banking. It was followed…
The fall of the “Mighty” Sean Quinn from Ireland’s (and Forbes-listed) richest man to one of the world’s most indebted individuals is perhaps the biggest story of Ireland’s boom-to-bust recent economic…
Executive remuneration is out of control in the United Kingdom. The final report by the High Pay Commission concluded that “there is rarely a link between directors’ incentives and the way a company performs…
The most interesting aspect of the United Kingdom’s Financial Service Authority’s exhaustive review of the failure of the Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) is contained in the foreword, penned by the organisation’s…
ANZ and National Australia Bank have passed on the Reserve Bank of Australia’s 0.25% interest rate cut to mortgage holders, lowering their standard variable rates. Treasurer Wayne Swan called on the big…
The Global Financial Crisis should be called the Global Debt Crisis. Too much debt has been created and there is not enough productive capacity to pay the interest on the debt, let alone repay the loans…
The appointment of Virginia Rometty as the first female chief executive of IBM represents a significant step forward for women in the world of business. But while Rometty’s elevation makes her one of the…
Kevin Davis, Australian Centre for Financial Studies
Eurozone leaders have moved to address liquidity fears, with the European Central Bank announcing new measures to head off a credit crunch. Britain has also announced quantitative easing measures. Outgoing…
The chief executive of Swiss banking giant UBS, Oswald Gruebel, has quit following revelations of a $US2.3 billion fraud by “rogue trader” Kweku Adoboli. But the news will come as cold comfort for investors…
The Federal Government has taken significant steps in recent years to protect consumers from predatory lending practices, such as very high-interest “payday loans”. An unfortunate, though surely unintentional…
So it’s finally here: Google Wallet, a free Android app that turns your (Google) smartphone into a mobile payment system, launched today. To do this, the company has partnered with Citi, MasterCard, First…