3 I am afraid that we are now increasingly hearing the same arguments in the context of the debate on financial reform. The crisis which began in the summer of 2007 has developed over time into one of the most disruptive and costly crises for our economies and societies that the world has experienced in many decades.
Therefore, both public authorities and the financial market participants have a collective responsibility to do whatever is needed to address weaknesses in the  1  I am very grateful to Katri Mikkonen for valuable inputs and to Fátima Pires, Fabio Recine and Panagiotis Strouzas for useful comments.