Three areas in which much progress has been made are: credit rating agencies, hedge funds and compensation practices. •  As regards credit rating agencies, a new EU regulation subjecting such agencies to mandatory registration and oversight in order to increase transparency and reduce conflicts of interest in the rating process has already entered into force in December 2009.
High on the policy agenda should be structural reforms to boost productivity growth, especially in the services sector, to improve the functioning of market mechanisms – so that markets respond more promptly and smoothly to the building up of disequilibria – and to strengthen market structures and institutions that foster competition and a culture of price stability.