Bankers play down moral hazard

Josef Ackermann, the chairman of the Institute of International Finance (IIF), trade body for the global banking industry, has claimed that banks will not take advantage of being deemed too big to fail.

Speaking at the IIF's annual meeting in Istanbul on Saturday, Ackerman said: "There have been suggestions that banks prefer to take advantage of a too-big-to-fail world that supports excessive risk taking. We do not. It is clearly untenable that taxpayers should bear the burden of banking failure