There is a real need to tame the wild markets into humane competitive environments that bring the best out of each and to each. But the volatility of the markets, and the room it makes for speculators, must be questioned. Anyone who claims that the disconnection between financial flows and actual trade and investment flows is insignificant must be asked to explain why arbitrage and rectification accounts for some 90 per cent of the transactions. You have to file specified types of audited financial data. If a person acquires more than five per cent of the equity of a company it has to be publicly acknowledged.
Insider trading is criminalised and prosecuted.
Anti-trust laws to prevent monopoly are in place, and are enforced. Yet the international capital markets are more similar to those of Albania at the time of the pyramid schemes than they are to Wall Street. The volatility is unbelievable and the inadequacy of the current level of regulation practiced by the international agencies, especially the IMF, is obvious. There is an urgent need to strengthen that oversight and temper the volatility of the markets. This will require greater discipline from all countries, and a voluntary relinquishing of some of their sovereignty in the interest of all.