Jarvis & Mackenzie Chairman Applauds Obama Banking Proposal

London, United Kingdom, February 03, 2010 --(PR.com)-- Jarvis & Mackenzie Chairman, Anthony Jarvis, welcomed on Friday, plans by U.S. President Barack Obama to curb risk-taking activities by banks, according to a Wall Street Journal report.

The commodity firm chairman has long been opposed to “the institutions” ability to play banker and broker at the same time.

It was this that formed the catalyst for Jarvis & Mackenzie to launch their own commodity investment fund, the J&M CIF®. Jarvis stated “As a commodity brokerage we have no desire to out source our client’s money in an attempt to bolster our own trading positions.”

"The proposal is certainly something we are extremely interested in," Jarvis was quoted as saying in an interview published on Friday.

“This limitation on the banking institutions is long over-due.”

"And, broadly speaking, we are very supportive of making sure certain activities, like prop trading activities, must not be allowed to grow again the way they did or really explode again."

The accomplished commodity trader said that it was not acceptable to have "vast, huge risk focused on prop trading - narrowly defined - that has nothing to do with client business but essentially puts the capital of the bank at risk in a highly leveraged manner."

Mindful of the problems they suffered in 2008, many major Swiss banks have acted to curb prop trading and slash their balance sheets.

Jarvis reiterated, “more needs to be done on the 'too big to fail' idea”, which, he has said in December, was the biggest challenge to the industry.

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