Icelandic collapse was inevitable by 2006
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A report into the Icelandic banking collapse has found that the authorities were negligent and that the crash was already inevitable as early as 2006 due to the rapid over-expansion of the banking system.
The report by the Special Investigation Commission, criticised former Icelandic Prime Minister Geir Haarde, former finance and business ministers and the head of the Icelandic central bank and the financial services regulator.
In the years preceding the crisis, Icelandic banks grew to 20 times their size, leaving the financial services regulator unable to cope with its rapid growth, the report says.
It also found that the regulator was understaffed and the staff it had were generally inexperienced.
The chair of the Investigation Commission Pall Hreinsson, said that a parliamentary committee would now decide whether to take legal action against the people named in the report.
He said: “They had the necessary information, but did not act accordingly, each pointing the finger at the next person.”
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Readers' comments (5)
Incompetent Regulators Award Team | 13 Apr 2010 8:48 am
Inexperienced and unqualified. I assume we the article is talking about FSA etc? Something we all know and still applies.
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Chris Boylan | 13 Apr 2010 9:46 am
The point that amazes me,in this sorry Norse Saga, is that UK Govt.bailed out foolish and greedy depositors at taxpayers expense with no plan in place to recover any of the money.
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John Harding | 13 Apr 2010 10:50 am
If this were read out at a quiz night with all names, in the current parlance, 'redacted' the majority of voters in the UK would think this was a report about the FSA!
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John Harding | 13 Apr 2010 11:27 am
Following on previous post - sorry a bit slow of me, had I considered my comments more carefully I would have realised that the suggestion that 'Legal Action' was being considered shows clearly that the report could never be about the great 'British' Regulator or British Ministers, they have legal exemption from all forms of responsibility, even when they don't do the job they are employed to do. The Regulators even fervently believe they have a right to bonuses! While the Icelanders obviously f.....-up big time there is some comfort in the thought that those responsible may have to face up to their mistakes. Why can that not be part of our system, it might have made some officials think twice?
I understand that in the Labour manifesto there are proposals to introduce a system whereby managements of 'failing' public sector institutions can be removed and replaced by others deemed more competent. The FSA should be subject to this immediately as it has proven itself to be 'unfit for purpose'.
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Anonymous | 13 Apr 2010 1:17 pm
As usual we see the FSA bigging themselves up after taking literally years (clearly incompetent) to find out someone is a crook, got it wrong etc, yet the banks remain untouched and as said already, for all their failings they think it's right to award themselves and allow the equally irresposible bankers to also award themselves huge bonuses. I'm starting to think the true example they set is to continually get it all wrong, fail to monitor, attack easy targgets, introduce retrospective rules, ignore the worst offenders, tell everyone else they are incompetant unless they get more qualifications, have no real clue what you're doing & delude ones self you are doing a great job in order to be worthy of earning big salaries and bonuses. Thanks FSA, I will adapt my business model to yours immediately.
Now, does anyone out there have a spare fag packet so I can get a fact find done?
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