Debevoise & Plimpton | Gregory J Lyons, Caroline N Swett and Chen Xu

Global

This article is an extract from Lexology Panoramic: Banking Regulation 2026. Click here for the full guide.

Banks play an important role in the worldwide economy as key providers of credit intermediation and other financial services. As a result, banks are subject to extensive regulations that, in recent decades, have become more complex and variable across jurisdictions. Public regulatory sources of banking law and regulation have grown increasingly multi-layered, and range from international to national and local regulations.

The financial crisis of 2007-2009 highlighted the interconnectedness of the banking sector and led to the most significant period of global bank regulatory reform since the Great Depression in the 1930s. The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in the United States and the creation of the banking union in the European Union sought to increase the accountability and transparency of banking institutions within jurisdictions. The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision’s Basel III framework, which heightened minimum capital requirements and leverage ratios for internationally active banks, and the Financial Stability Board’s Key Attributes of Effective Resolution Regimes for Financial Institutions, which set bank resolution standards, also provided frameworks for the consistent application of prudential standards worldwide. Bank regulation is consistently evolving, reflecting newly identified issues and the views of those leading various governments as to the proper balance between regulation and market forces.

By providing a multi-jurisdictional analysis of how various legal systems treat the regulation of banks, this edition of Banking Regulation hopes to provide our readers with the tools to begin substantive conversations with fellow practitioners across borders. The series addresses some of the most common questions that arise in banking law, including bank licensing and chartering, capital requirements, supervision, consumer protection, enforcement, resolution, control and ownership, and other topics. In doing so, this volume hopes to provide both a foundational and updated understanding of banking laws and regulations.

This article first appeared on Lexology | Source