ADB calls for collective action to enhance Asia’s financial resilience

HA NOI, VIET NAM - ADB President Haruhiko Kuroda today called on Asian governments to harmonise efforts to build more resilient and stable financial systems.

“The global financial crisis has highlighted the importance of enhancing financial stability via measures taken at national, regional and global levels,” Mr. Kuroda said at a seminar at ADB’s 44th Annual Meeting in Ha Noi, Viet Nam. “Much progress in this area has been made, but more still needs to be done.” The joint ADB/Asian Development Bank Institute (ADBI) seminar, “Working Together Towards Better Financial Regulation and Stability in Asia,” looked at weaknesses exposed during the recent global financial crisis. These included insufficient macro-prudential supervision, still underdeveloped regional financial markets, and high vulnerability to volatile capital flows.

Mario Lamberte, Director of Research at ADBI, noted that Asia’s financial systems held up relatively well to the strains of the recent crisis, in part because of reform and restructuring taken after the region’s own financial crisis a decade earlier.

“However, policymakers need to do much more to develop and deepen the region’s financial markets and, at the same time, protect still-vulnerable financial systems from future threats,” Mr. Lamberte said.

In addition to Mr. Kuroda and Mr. Lamberte, other speakers at the seminar were: Bandid Nijathaworn, Deputy Governor for Financial Monetary Stability and Financial Institutions Stability, Bank of Thailand; Naoyuki Shinohara, Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund; William Shorten, Australia’s Minister for Financial Services and Superannuation; and Thomas Wieser, Director General for Economic Policy and Financial Markets at Austria’s Ministry of Finance.