Academic

In a newsy week, here's a couple of international developments not to be missed, courtesy of Securities Mosaic:

• Congress can legislate all it wants, but even more dramatic regulatory reform can be found in the Basel Committee's consultative document, which actually contains many of the proposals reformist academics have been mulling.  Such as: "Introducing a leverage ratio as a supplementary measure to the Basel II risk-based framework with a view to migrating to a Pillar 1 treatment based on appropriate review and calibration. The leverage ratio will help contain the build-up of excessive leverage in the banking system, and introduce additional safeguards against model risk and measurement error."  I can't see Congress pulling leverage caps off; sometimes getting things done the undemocratic way is the only way to get it.
• Derivatives regulation - and this is Congress's idea - may be pursued extraterritorially: "Some of the regulatory bills being proposed in the United States, however, have raised concerns among international banks they could allow U.S. regulators to impose capital requirements on European banks that operate in the country, on top of rules planned for the continent."