GRI was pleased to host a discussion on Preserving Financial Resilience in Banking with Ben Gully, Assistant Superintendent of the Office of the Superintendent of Financial Institutions (OSFI) on April 27, 2021. Nearly 275 individuals attended this event to hear about the latest developments on the internationally agreed upon Basel III reforms which are a foundation for a resilient banking system.

With responsibility for Canada’s regulation sector, Ben shared OSFI’s latest proposals and guidelines for federally regulated financial institutions on the domestic implementation of these global standards and the public consultation that is open until June 4, 2021.

The finalization of the Basel III framework will contribute to the strong reputation of our Canadian financial system and will help our banks attract capital and funding from investors domestically and from around the world.

Ben highlighted three key principles for implementation – fit for Canada, setting the right incentives and enhanced proportionality. The global standards must support good outcomes for Canada as part of a well-functioning global financial system; they should improve the consistency and risk sensitivity of the capital rules with the right incentive structures to banks; and they should strike a balance for small banks between improving the risk sensitivity of the requirements and address rising complexity of the frameworks.

In his remarks, Ben also talked about the future of regulatory reform and responding to new and evolving risks. In the Q&A, he discussed other topics including the risks related to technology and climate change.