Incentives for complexity in financial regulation
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of the paper is to find out which incentives are present for persons who are taking care of financial regulation in practice, and how these incentives impact their attitudes towards complexity of financial regulation.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on recent contributions, reasons behind the increase in complexity observed in financial regulation are discussed. The role of actual incentives for the persons involved in setting up and enforcing regulation is detailed.
Findings
Incentives for persons that impact drafting and implementation of financial regulation produce a bias towards excessive complexity. Additional complexity reduces the risk for being exposed to aggressive journalism and pressure from populist politicians. Increasing complexity of regulation will also benefit large players since the costs are largely fixed.
Research limitations/implications
Careful studies measuring the costs of increased complexity in terms of increased resource requirements are needed.
Practical implications
To reduce the bias towards excess complexity, a body consisting of knowledgeable persons with high integrity is required with an explicit mandate of scrutinising regulation in order to reduce, or at least not increase, complexity. This body must be empowered with sufficient discretion to tackle cases that lack precedents.
Originality/value
The paper introduces an explicit discussion of existing incentives on the regulator side of financial markets to increase the understanding of the issues involved in the increased complexity that we observe in the rules that are implemented to guide behaviour in financial markets.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
JEL classification – G28An early version of this paper was presented as a keynote speech at the conference: “Governance and control in banking and finance: a new paradigm for risk and performance” April 18, 2013 in Paris. Comments received by participants are gratefully acknowledged.
Citation
Berglund, T. (2014), "Incentives for complexity in financial regulation", Journal of Risk Finance, Vol. 15 No. 2, pp. 102-109. https://doi.org/10.1108/JRF-12-2013-0083
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2014, Emerald Group Publishing Limited