The Bankers' Week… in Brief because It's Christmas!

On Monday:

• the government adopted the Independent Commission on Banking recommendations (well mostly)

• a parliamentary committee recommended that parliamentary and government oversight of financial regulators including the BoE be strengthened and clarified

• Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg took another swipe at excessive bank bonuses.

On Tuesday

• The BoE outlined what powers it thinks its new Financial Policy Committee should command

• Parliament’s Public Accounts Committee damned the HMRC for doing deals with large reluctant tax payers (among them Goldman Sachs)

On Wednesday

• News broke of the scramble by European banks to take up the European Central Bank’s  489 billion worth of cheap euro loans – a “road to nowhere” on the ECB’s ploy to ease the eurozone crisis commented Robert Peston.

• Speculation grew that the results of tightening bank rules may inadvertently serve to boost opportunities for unregulated or “shadow” financial players

• We learned the Canadian central bank faces legal proceedings by concerned citizens for allowing  the country’s monetary and financial policy to be dictated by foreign banks contrary to the Bank of Canada Act since 1974. Sadly not many other central bankers will be worrying over their Christmas dinner about this.

On Thursday it all went a bit quiet –  even the monetary system slows down for Christmas. In the spirit of the season here’s a quiz.

• Who is Britain’s highest paid civil servant, at least by one ingenious definition? The answer is here.

Have a Happy Christmas.