BoC Governor and Future BoE Carney Gives Talk to B-school

Bank of Canada Governor Mark Carney gave a speech to Richard Ivey Business School in London, Ontario earlier today. The biggest highlight was his Five C initiatives to bring back trust in institutional and public finances.

The Five Cs are:

• Capital
• Clarity
• Capitalism
• Connecting with clients
• Core values

An excerpt from his closing remarks:

Global banks have made significant progress in reforming their compensation practices so that rewards more closely match risk profiles. In addition, boards of directors and risk committees are taking more responsibility to ensure that remuneration packages and employee behaviour are aligned with updated institutional cultures.12

Unfortunately, a spate of conduct scandals ranging from rigging LIBOR to money laundering has overshadowed these steady and material improvements.

This underscores that it remains the collective responsibility of banks, regulators and other stakeholders to rebuild trust in banking. Banks need to participate actively in reform, not fight it. Until recently, too few bankers acknowledged their industry’s role in the fiasco. The time for remorse is far from over.

At the same time, the public sector needs to be more vocal and appreciative when the industry makes major contributions. This has been the case with the EDTF and in work on bail-in debt, a key element of ending “too big to fail.” In addition, the best global organisations are now recognising the need to address their corporate ethics. All of these efforts should be publicly encouraged and reinforced.

Ultimately, it will be down to individual bankers, including the Ivey grads who will go into finance. Which tradition will you uphold? Will your professional values be distinct from your personal ones? What will you leave those who come after you?

For the full text of the speech visit the Bank of Canada website

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