That is not only because when pertinent information is available, the economic agents can make better decisions and engineer a better allocation of capital – but also because transparency is an important protection against “herd behaviour” and the propagation of any crisis.
One of the lessons we learned from the Asian Crisis ten years ago was the strong need to improve transparency in the emerging economies as regards in particular their reserve assets and their monetary and fiscal policies. In the financial markets of the industrialised world we have exactly the same lessons to be learned. 29. How healthy is the banking system in Europe?