Strategic conversations on
the two-currency world,
between integration and disintegration

ISBN 2-907587-02-1

 The Asian crisis and the creation of the euro have in common to suggest that today’s “globalization” is a halfway house calling for better governance. The level of integration triggered by global markets and massive flows of capital can only be sustained if common standards insure higher levels of transparency, effective dispute settlement and market oversight. The euro is but one step –even if an essential one for Europe– accelerating the global evolution toward deeper integration in what is now a two-currency world.

What are the opportunities and risks of this world with two anchor-currencies? How far will market concentration proceed? Will Europe have a single stock exchange and a single regulator? Will a global “market of markets” blur barriers between continents? Or are the “Asian crisis” and EU-U.S. trade conflicts warning signs of far reaching disintegration that could sweep away the new-born euro and make us wish back the good old days when “interdependence” and “globalization” had not yet the depth of today’s integration?

Strategic conversations around these global challenges are conducted by PROMETHEE and Ernst & Young around the “WISE” concept:

Wealth creation: the changing strategies of global-minded banks and insurance companies as they respond to the co-existence of two very liquid and sophisticated sets of markets;
Integration: the role of stock exchanges and financial network operators in facilitating genuine cross-border integration for investors and issuers;
Supervision: the views of leading regulators from BIS, COB, IASC, IMF, SEC to provide integrated markets with essential accounting standards, bank supervision and oversight;
Expansion: the strategies for emerging markets in Asia to overcome the present financial crisis and to resume their role as engines for global growth and for social progress.

The research and discussion process has been directed by Albert Bressand, Ph.D. and Catherine Distler, PROMETHEE, in cooperation with Robert Stein, David Cannon and Ivan Wagner, who direct the Global Financial Services group of Ernst & Young.

Edited by
Albert Bressand
Perspectives on global governance by:
Sir Leon Brittan, Michel Camdessus and Deryck Maughan
With the participation of:
Prime Minister of Vietnam Mr. Phan Van Khai,
Bank for International Settlements (Andrew Crockett, General Manager), Barclays PLC (Sir Andrew Large, Vice-Chairman), Citigroup/Salomon Smith Barney (Deryck Maughan, Vice-Chairman), Commission des Opérations de Bourse (Michel PradaChairman), Dresdner Bank AG (Ernst-Moritz Lipp, Member of the Board of Managing Directors), Edmond Israel Foundation (André Lussi, Chairman), Eurostat (Yves Franchet, Director General), FIBV (Gerrit de Marez Oyens, Secretary General), Generali (Antoine Bernheim, Chairman), Hong Kong Stock Exchange (Alec Tsui, CEO), IASC (Sir Bryan Carsberg, Secretary General), International Monetary Fund (IMF), ISIS (Malaysia) (Noordin Sopiee, Chairman & CEO), Kuala Lumpur Stock Exchange (Salleh A. Majid, President), NASDAQ (Alfred R. Berkeley III, President), Securities and Exchange Commission (Richard Lindsey, Director of the Division of Market Regulation), Société Générale (Daniel Bouton, Chairman & CEO), Swiss Exchange SWX/EUREX (Antoinette Hunziker-Ebneter, CEO), The Stock Exchange (Bombay) (Ramesh C. Mathur, Executive Director).

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