Barbados and its Caribbean neighbours need to join forces and improve oversight of their financial services sectors in the face of continued pressure from international forces.
Minister of Finance Chris Sinckler made that recommendation yesterday, while pointing to “ongoing harassment” by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), a “very invasive and almost invective type approach” by the United States Congress on the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act, and Canada news reports of the negative fallout for Canadian banks in the region as areas that concerned him.
He was speaking yesterday at the official opening of the Caribbean Association of Pension Supervisors Conference at Hilton Barbados. Sinckler said increased exchange of information and harmonisation of regulations and legislation in the Caribbean was “absolutely critical” in these circumstances.
“We are having some not so glorious reports of some of the financial instability in our financial sectors across the region in the various jurisdictions and the level of concentration particularly in the banking sector and the cross-fertilisation and its impact on the non-bank financial sector on the banking sector. And it is an issue that we have to pay very, very close attention to,” he said.
“I have seen over the last couple days that a number of articles are being produced in the major Canadian newspapers and journals about the impact of the financial instability in the region on Canadian banks in particular and the dramatic fall-off in profitability of those institutions.
“So as we deal with all the issues that we have to deal with in relation to financial stability, the ongoing harassment by the OECD, the very invasive and almost invective type approach of the US Congress on FACTA, as we deal with our own issues in terms of the failure of one major insurance company and of course our economic challenges, I think that the sharing of information, this cross-fertilisation of regulation is absolutely critical to what we do to maintain the region as a pristine, well regulated and profitable jurisdiction for financial interventions.”
Sinckler told conference participants the recent financial crisis “has highlighted the importance of financial sector supervision in order to ensure financial stability, and it has also shown the critical need for cross-border collaboration on national financial sector policies.”
(SC)
