Geithner Meeting Barnier on Basel III Presses Banks
(Adds comment from Pascal Lamy under subheadline ‘Jury Still Out’ in 22nd paragraph.)
By Yalman Onaran, Simon Clark and Joseph Heaven
May 17 (Bloomberg) -- Two days after European Union leaders announced an almost $1 trillion plan to shore up debt markets, Michel Barnier, the EU’s financial services commissioner, was eating scones and sipping coffee with Timothy F. Geithner.
Also on the menu at the Washington meeting, Barnier’s first with the U.S. Treasury secretary: new international rules being considered by the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision. In a statement after the talks, the two men affirmed their commitment to push for “stronger capital and liquidity requirements.”
The May 12 meeting, one of a series Barnier held last week with U.S. bankers, regulators and government officials, signals the growing importance of politicians in setting global banking rules. The Basel committee is racing against a December deadline set by the Group of 20 nations, and banks faced with raising what UBS AG estimates may be $375 billion of fresh capital are appealing to nationalist sentiments to ease the pain.
