Can’t we all just get along? Europe’s banks and financial institutions have again been dragged kicking and screaming into the political spotlight, this time over the fight for control of the world’s accounting standards. Last week the European Commission decided to delay introduction until at least next year of emergency accounting rules designed to simplify how financial instruments are recorded. The rift is over who will set the rules for bean counters, but come earnings season, it will be inquiring investors who lose out.

In April, the Group of 20 nations asked the International Accounting Standards Board – standard setters for most major nations except the US – to devise new rules. The aim: to prevent a repeat of last year’s wild swings in the earnings of banks. And the IASB gave them exactly what they wanted. The new rules sort financial assets into two buckets: equities and risky products that will be recorded at fair value, and loans and other stable instruments logged at amortised cost. So why, only seven weeks out from the year-end, has Brussels felt it necessary to intervene?