A Stalinist Approach to Banking

The head of Bafin, the German banking regulator, boasts that his staff will become 'permanent guests' in all major banking institutions. This confirms our long-standing theory that only ever-closer control of all aspects of banking will satisfy the politicians' urge to supervise the business and make it conform to their wishes. Every rule needs interpretation which means another rule which leads to another rule and so on. As no one wants to make a mistake each decision will have to be cleared with a supervisor. At the end there will be a stalinist system of one 'commissar' standing behind each front line banker and the banking system will be completely ossified. 

Cash bonuses reduce risk - Study

Banking regulators all over the world think that it will help to reduce the risk of the banking system if they require a larger portion of total compensation to be paid in the form of equity. A recent study refutes this notion and tries to demonstrate that cash incentives are better suited to achieve a less risky banking system.

Musings of a Hedge Fund Manager

If ever you thought that the books on management you read at University were full of obvious platitudes you have seen nothing yet. Ray Dalio, the founder of Bridgewater, may have been successful - being in the right place at the right time and starting a money management business at the bottom of the market in 1975 must have helped - but I wonder how he could have found it useful to concoct a philosophy or life and business that just is a very poor copy of what one can find in countless books about self-improvement that are so popular in America.