Significant structural reform to be made in the UK banking sector

Up until now, reform of the financial markets has concentrated on measures aimed at improving the ability of the banking sector to withstand crises, facilitating the orderly rundown of banks, which are no longer viable, and restraining risk-taking by adjusting the incentives that currently dominate the market. However, last year the authorities made determined moves to tackle the "too big to fail" problem and proposed stricter requirements on systemically important banks than on other banks. In some countries these measures have been considered inadequate and structural reform of the banking sector has also been proposed.