Is George Osborne about to hit the UK banking industry?
Many believe that George Osborne will use his Mansion House speech this evening to launch a number of new initiatives aimed at the UK banking arena. He will warn them that they need to pay for the damage which "they inflicted" on the UK economy and indeed there will be talk of new banking taxes and a banking levy discussed.
It is also believed that many Liberal Democrat politicians are pushing George Osborne to instigate an investigation into integrated banking arrangements such as Barclays Bank, which operate both commercial banking activities and investment banking operations. Some of the more radical moves discussed include splitting commercial banking and investment banking into two separate entities thereby reducing the risk to an overall company from any one of these operations. This is not something which will go down well in the City where the likes of Barclays Bank, one of the integrated banking giants, has operated relatively successfully for many years.
Even though it may seem like a knee-jerk reaction to a once-in-a-lifetime event, i.e. the credit crunch, the UK banking arena could be about to change forever with many people concerned that the financial industry has become too powerful and too influential.
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