French bankers and politicians are increasingly fretting over what they feel is a return to bad old banking practices on the other side of the Atlantic. After all, in the words of one leading Parisian banker, the whole financial crisis started in the US because of the lack of regulation and the shoddy and inept management of American banks and financial institutions.

But rather than being keen to learn from past mistakes and the other broader lessons of the crisis, the US banks seem to be slipping back to their questionable pre-crisis ways. Echoing the worries of many of his old continental peers, the same banker argues that there is a trinity of issues needing urgent attention.