The importance of market discipline has been rapidly growing at both the regulatory and market levels in recent decades. However, firm/system-wide financial failures during the global financial crisis supported the idea of more regulation. The result has been in the author's view, excessive or...

This article analyses a fundamental aspect of the current European market infrastructure for holding debt and equity securities. Securities are traded on an exchange or over the counter. After trading transactions are completed through a process of clearing and settlement. At the end of the...