Financial industry may not accept new rules willingly
Business Times - 19 May 2009 Financial industry may not accept new rules willingly By LEON HADAR WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT THEY have been described as 'exotic financial instruments' and for years most of us were embarrassed to admit that we really did not understand what these Big Shots in Wall Street were talking about. Indeed, while the financial instruments known as derivatives were created as a way of managing risk, they had grown over the last decade into a gigantic market. More importantly, the whiz-kids who invented derivatives used so much jargon that it made it seem like these financial products were a theoretical sub-field of the science of quantum mechanics. Of course, by now it is safe to say that most of those Americans who have seen their retirement money invested in the stock market evaporate into thin air and who are in danger of losing their homes have become familiar with the risky trade derivatives. They know now that derivatives have grown in a largely unregu