KUALA LUMPUR - Banks must study the Basel II upgrade of international rules for bank safety to ensure their holdings of over-the-counter (OTC) financial derivative contracts comply with risk-weighted capital charges, Malaysia\'s central bank governor said in February.

On November 6, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) proposed two new rules. One concerns the supervision of investment bank holding companies (SIBHC); the other concerns the Alternative Net Capital Requirements for broker-dealers. Both would involve investment banks being supervised on a group-wide basis, and meeting Basel-style capital adequacy standards.

A crucial aim of the new Basel accord is to bring a bank\'s regulatory and economic capital into line.In a guest article, SunGard\'s David Rowe, Dean Jovic and Richard Reeves explain why

SAN DIEGO, California, March 18 - US regulators are pledged to take whatever steps are necessary to retain a level playing field, if there are signs of a competitive problem for smaller US banks from the Basel II capital rules, US Federal Reserve Board chairman Alan Greenspan said this week.

LONDON, March 24 - Global standards setters plan to make it easier to follow the cumulative effect of the development of new accounting rules to help improve consultation procedures, International Accounting Standards Board (IASB) officials said today.

SANTIAGO de CHILE, March 30 - The world\'s top banking regulator has said he\'d like to see a dialogue going ahead between Latin American banks and their supervisors on implementing the Basel II upgrade of international rules for bank safety.

LONDON, March 8 - The UK government today launched two reviews - one of corporate governance in mutual life firms and the other of the actuarial profession - as well as a study of accounting for with-profits life policies, after issuing a long-awaited report on the Equitable Life disaster.

BRUSSELS, March 15 - The European Commission said today it is committed to issuing a draft directive on the European version of the Basel II update of international rules for bank safety this summer.

LONDON - UK regulators will continue pushing ahead in the coming year with their risk-based capital proposals for both life and general insurance sectors, covering both direct insurers and re-insurers, Britain\'s chief financial regulator said in January.

TEL AVIV - The cost of implementing the Basel II upgrade of international rules for bank safety for a large Israeli bank such as Bank Hapoalim or Bank Leumi is likely to be 3-5 million shekels ($682,000 to $1.1 million or €555,600 to €926,000), according to Michael Adam, senior solutions consultant at German business software provider SAP.