We expect all financial institutions to properly inform and educate their customers on security measures implemented, and how customers can and should protect themselves. At the same time, various educational and awareness initiatives are being undertaken by relevant agencies, including the Financial Education Network (FEN) and Bank Negara Malaysia, such as through Amaran Scam Facebook page (facebook.com/amaranpenipuan). We also work with other law enforcement agencies and authorities to investigate fraud incidents and provide assistance and supports to victims. PDRM’s Scam Response Centre which was set up in collaboration with Bank Negara Malaysia, MCMC and the financial industry aims to ensure that immediate action can be taken to prevent further financial losses and attempt to recover stolen funds. For this, customers should lodge their complaints to their banks and the police immediately upon discovering that they have been defrauded or scammed. We are committed to working with other authorities to further strengthen existing arrangements in ongoing efforts to combat fraud and financial crime. This includes sharing of resources, expertise and data, as well as joint preventive measures. Compliance officers in the financial industry also have a role to play by being vigilant of emerging scam typologies and ensuring that response measures remain effective against new threats. I urge the entire compliance profession, including self-regulatory bodies, to take up leading roles to identify red flags and develop guidance to mitigate these threats. In 2019, we launched MyFINet to facilitate intelligence sharing on financial crimes.
Even if liquidity abounds, it does not move from those who have it in excess to those in demand, because of the great uncertainty that exists and the decision of financial entities to hold on to their liquidity surpluses to cushion themselves against balance-sheet shocks (Allen and Carletti, 2008) or simply to benefit from buying assets at discount prices. The financial crisis is the outcome of two key phenomena. On one side is a period of stability, low interest rates, abundant liquidity, fast economic growth and an asset price bubble (figure 7). This combination of aggregate factors gives way, as often occurs, to a phase of fast credit expansion. Actually, a financial crisis is much more likely to owe to a credit expansion, but not every credit boom ends up in a crisis 4 . At the same time, many countries have recorded a real-estate boom, but not all of them have found themselves in the extreme financial system breakdown as the United States. The problem is that this has occurred within a spiral of financial innovation in very poorly regulated market segments. One important task will be to figure out why the financial systems of different economies with similar credit growth rates and housing price behaviors have had so different outcomes. The low interest rates prompted a search for better returns. Individuals with zero repayment capacity were provided loans, and to reduce the risk, said loans were securitized and often taken out of the banks' balance sheets (i.e.