Big banks must become globally resolvable – or significantly ‘smaller’

The subsidised emergency takeover of Credit Suisse by UBS brings the current global ‘too big to fail’ regime into question. This column argues that an in-depth analysis of the global resolution framework by both regulators and academics is needed. The main question is whether a resolution of a global systemically important bank is indeed feasible in plausible scenarios. An affirmation would clearly be the best possible result of this analysis. However, if such a resolution proves not to be realistic, then there should be no hesitation to drastically reduce the global risks of such institutions via regulation of their business models.