Banks are afraid of the financial crisis
This week, the IMF warned of "vulnerabilities" among so-called non-banking financial institutions, saying that global financial stability could depend on their resilience. The Bank of England drew attention to this problem last month. Source: Global investors polled by Bank of America pointed to a group of US non-banks as the most likely source of the credit crunch. What are non-banks and how risky are they? These are financial firms other than banks that provide all types of financial services, including lending to households and businesses. Non-banks range from pension funds and insurance companies to high-risk mutual funds and hedge funds. Non-banking assets account for almost half of all global financial assets. After the crisis, interest rates reached their lowest level, when many depositors and investors turned to non-banks in search of higher profits. As regulators imposed more and more restrictions on bank lending, certain types of borrowers, such as riskier consumers, increasingly turned to nonbanks for funding. Non-banks that provide loans are known as "shadow banks", although the term is often used inaccurately to refer to all non-banks. Shadow banks...