Overview

The Financial Stability Board (FSB) is an international body that monitors and makes recommendations about the global financial system. It was established in the 2009 G20 Pittsburgh Summit as a successor to the Financial Stability Forum (FSF). The Board includes all G20 major economies, FSF members, and the European Commission. Hosted and funded by the Bank for International Settlements, the board is based in Basel, Switzerland, and is established as a not-for-profit association under Swiss law.

The FSB represented the G20 leaders' first major international institutional innovation. U.S. treasury secretary Tim Geithner has described it as "in effect, a fourth pillar" of the architecture of global economic governance, alongside the International Monetary Fund, World Bank, and the World Trade Organization.

Unlike some other multilateral financial institutions, the FSB lacks a treaty basis and formal power, and relies instead on an informal and nonbinding memorandum of understanding for cooperation adopted by its members.

Financial Stability Forum

The FSB's predecessor organization, the Financial Stability Forum (FSF), had emerged from a group of finance ministries, central bankers, and international financial bodies, which had been founded in 1999 to promote international financial stability by the finance ministers and central bank governors of G7 countries. The FSF facilitated discussion and cooperation on supervision and surveillance of financial institutions, transactions, and events. FSF was managed by a small secretariat housed at the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland.

The FSF membership included about a dozen nations who participate through their central banks, financial ministries and departments, and securities regulators, including: the United States, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Italy, Canada, Australia, the Netherlands and several other industrialized economies as well as several international economic organizations. At the G20 summit on 15 November 2008, it was agreed that the membership of the FSF will be expanded to include emerging economies, such as China.

The 2009 G20 London summit decided to establish a successor to the FSF, the Financial Stability Board (FSB) to include members of the G20 who had not been FSF members.

2012 reforms

At the 2011 G20 Cannes summit, the G20 called for a strengthening of the FSB's capacity resources and governance by establishing the FSB "on an enduring organizational basis". In its 2012 report to the G20 Los Cabos summit, the FSB set out concrete steps to strengthen the organization's capacity, resources, and governance as well as establish it on an enduring organizational footing. The G20 endorsed the FSB's restated and amended charter.

In January 2013, the FSB became a separate legal entity in the form of an association or "Verein" under Swiss law, when its Articles of Association were adopted by the FSB Plenary.

The FSB is hosted and funded by the Bank for International Settlements under a five-year agreement executed between the two in January 2013. The bank bears the majority of the FSB's operating expenses, and the FSB does not have any assets, liabilities, or revenue.

2016 reforms

In late July 2016, after the world markets had faced a number of crises, including terrorism and the UK's decision to leave the European Union, Carney sent a letter to Finance Ministers attending the G20 Summit and to Central Bank Governors outlining the reforms the FSB had made indicating that the global economy and financial system had "continued to function effectively" and had "weathered" the "spikes in uncertainty and risk aversion", confirming that "this resilience in the face of stress demonstrates the enduring benefits of G20 post-crisis reforms".

He emphasized the value of specific reforms that had been implemented by the Financial Stability Board stating that these had "dampened aftershocks from [global financial crises] rather than amplifying them". He expressed confidence in the FSB's strategies, stating that "resilience in the face of stress demonstrates the enduring benefits of G20 post-crisis reforms".

In November 2016, the FSB and the board of the Bank for International Settlements agreed to a further five-year extension of the agreement from January 2018 to 2023.

Membership and leadership

The FSB has 71 member institutions, comprising ministries of finance, central banks, and supervisory and regulatory authorities from 25 jurisdictions as well as 13 international organizations and standard-setting bodies, and 6 Regional Consultative Groups reaching out to 65 other jurisdictions around the world.

^(1) Russian authorities have agreed not to participate in FSB meetings at present.