Quotes of the month

“In the US, there are still way too many banks and consolidation must happen. If you believe that, you should be a leader, not a follower”

Bill Harrison, former CEO of JPMorgan Chase, thinks shrinking is far from the only way to boost bank returns 

“Scale has become absolutely critical in universal banking. Our model, when you look at the core of its success, has been the fact that we know very well the market because we have a very big presence”

Gonzalo Gortazar, CEO of Spain’s CaixaBank, is another senior banker who believes in scale rather than shrinkage

“Issuing a green bond is a signal to the market that here is a company that thinks about risks related to climate change and has a plan for how to tackle them by making investments. This could and should affect the broader assessment of the credit risk of that issuer”

Zurich Insurance’s Manuel Lewin foresees fundamental impact from the green bond market 

“Investors cannot be held responsible for this, nor foreign investors, as some officials [have done]. Regulators and political leaders have to shoulder all the blame”

Xiang Songzuo of Agricultural Bank Of China believes that the reasons for the stock market rout in China can be found firmly in Beijing 

“This is what markets do. These sorts of moments are an opportunity for us”

Yin Ke, head of Citic Securities, sees the positives of the China crisis