Bankers Running Rings Around Regulators

In 2009, as the financial crisis entered its darkest days, G20 leaders descended on London for a meeting aimed at bringing the world economy back from the brink.

President Obama outlined the "unprecedented steps to restore growth and prevent a crisis like this from happening again."

Banker bashing was rife, with Gordon Brown comparing the masters of the universe to children who needed some tough love.

"In our families we raise our children to work hard, to do their best, and do their bit. We don't reward them for taking risks that... put them or others in danger," said Brown as he hosted the G20 meeting which was painted at the time as the summit that saved the global economy.

Last weekend Brown admitted the great and the good meeting at the G20 that week in March 2009, when global equity markets bottomed, didn’t really understand what was going on.

“We didn't understand how risk was spread across the system, we didn't understand the entanglements of different institutions with the other and we didn't understand even though we talked about it just how global things were, including a shadow banking system as well as a banking system,” said Brown in a speech in New Hampshire in the United States.

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