OECD: Regulation should focus on financial literacy

As the financial world gets itself in a tizzy about Rule 151A, and the subsequent decision to remand said rule, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development released a report saying imposing stiffer rules on banks is insufficient to prevent future crises, the Financial Times reports. Instead, efforts to protect private savings should be centered on rules that protect consumers and improve financial literacy.

“Over the last two decades, consumers have been burdened with a greater share of credit and pension risks,” said Andr? Laboul, head of the financial affairs division of the OECD, in a letter to accompany the report.

“Yet consumer awareness and understanding of these risks has hardly improved,” he added. “Consumer vulnerabilities, which have been further exposed through mis-selling and questionable market practices of financial market players, have been one of the sources of the mortgage market disruptions in the US which, in turn, sparked the global financial and economic crisis.”