The smooth functioning of the financial system is critically dependent on a sophisticated and evolving infrastructure comprising of payment, clearing, trading, information, settlement, messaging and legal systems which is often taken for granted. However, glitches and gaps in this ‘invisible’ part of the market have the capacity to seriously disrupt the financial system as was highlighted yet again through the problems caused by the lack of proper settlement in the Credit Default Swap market in the current crisis.

More often than not both financial institutions failures as well as financial system wobbles are driven by bad housekeeping which has become ever more important as the financial system has become more complex and inter-connected. Especially because such ‘back office’ systems are hidden from sight, governments and regulators need to be proactive in ensuring that such systems do not lag behind market innovations and are resilient.