Just before Christmas Sir John Gieve, Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, was widely reported as saying that the Bank of England completely missed out on forseeing the crisis of 2008.
The reports were based upon an interview Sir John gave for the BBC's Panorama series, which aired on 22nd December.
In the programme, Sir John states: "We didn't think it [the financial crisis] was going to be anything like
as severe as it's turned out to be. I think that's
because we, perhaps, hadn't kept pace with the extent of globalisation"
Alternatively, it could be because the UK has the lowest level of central bank staffing in the
European Union, according to the latest Central Bank Directory.
The Directory shows that the Bank of England reduced staff numbers by 20% over the past five years. The Bank now has 2.9 staff per 100,000 people in
the population, compared to 14.4 staff per 100,000 in the Eurozone and 6.98 staff per 100,000 in America.
Or maybe this is not the case, as I don't remember the American and European central bankers anticipating the severity either.
Chris M Skinner
Chris Skinner is best known as an independent commentator on the financial markets through his blog, TheFinanser.com, as author of the bestselling book Digital Bank, and Chair of the European networking forum the Financial Services Club. He has been voted one of the most influential people in banking by The Financial Brand (as well as one of the best blogs), a FinTech Titan (Next Bank), one of the Fintech Leaders you need to follow (City AM, Deluxe and Jax Finance), as well as one of the Top 40 most influential people in financial technology by the Wall Street Journal's Financial News. To learn more click here...
