U.S. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System Governor Lael Brainard spoke at the Global Finance Forum regarding maintaining resiliency across economic cycles.  Governor Brainard drew comparisons between the current state of the economy and the economy prior to the financial crisis, noting positive growth, but highlighting elevated risks in asset valuation and business leverage.  Governor Brainard discussed that post-crisis regulation has greatly improved the capital and liquidity positions of financial institutions, and highlighted the importance of maintaining a dynamic capital regime, but cautioned against purely backward-looking analysis, rather than proactively seeking out emerging risks.  Governor Brainard discussed the importance of properly tailoring and calibrating existing regulations, such as the countercyclical capital buffer rule, but also stressed the importance of implementing additional critical regulatory elements, such as finalizing the net stable funding ratio, which she noted was close to finalization, and the Dodd-Frank Act limits on large counterparty exposure.  Governor Brainard also expressed her support for improving the efficiency of the Volcker Rule without undermining its efficacy, and for moving forward with minimum haircuts for securities financing transactions.  Governor Brainard distinguished these regulations, designed to promote the resiliency of large financial institutions, with the regulation of smaller institutions, suggesting that with respect to the latter, regulations should be appropriately tailored to reduce regulatory burden.

View full text of Governor Brainard's speech.