New rules for European banks?

Imagine 27 national banking crises and 27 bailout and a series of new regulations�that’s a doomsday scenario for the E.U. and it could happen. The Irish government moved to guarantee its banks and opponents to the move say the Irish banks now have an unfair advantage. On Sunday, the Dutch, France and Luxembourg moved to save a couple banks�the latest patch to a leaky ship. But the Belgian Prime Minister defended the bailout. Jobs may have been saved, but analysts say Europe’s whole banking system needs to be overhauled and centralized. Today, the E.U. commission president called for a Europe-wide policy for regulating banks, whether operating locally or across borders. So here’s what the E.U. is proposing: to increase oversight of banks, especially for complex assets such as derivates, to make insurance on deposits uniform, and to make the salaries of bank executives public information. This analyst says that’s good policy, who says the lack of rules and regulation right now proves the need for such policy. He thinks this crisis has claimed enough victims to force banks to accept uniform regulation across Europe. But getting 27 countries to agree to all that will take months, maybe years and in the meantime, European countries continue to falter.