The Ethics of Banking
Conclusions from the Financial Crisis

Authors: Peter Koslowski



One of the few books on the ethical side of the financial crisis

Analyzes the systemic and the ethical mistakes that led to the financial crisis of 2008

Investigates the role of speculation in the formation of the financial crisis

This book analyzes the systemic and the ethical mistakes that have led to the financial crisis of 2008. It explores the middle ground between the argument that financial managers cannot be expected to take responsibility for a systemic crisis and the argument that moral failure is the one and only origin of the crisis. The book investigates the role of speculation in the formation of the crisis. It distinguishes between productive speculation for hedging and for securing market liquidity on the one hand, and unproductive and even detrimental hyper-speculation, on the other. The book argues that hyper-speculation goes far beyond the degree of speculation that is necessary for the liquidity of financial markets in a developed economy, and has thus increased the risks of the financial system and will continue to do so. This book offers an ethics of banking and an ethical economy of the financial markets to counterbalance the financial industry’s purely economic approach.

Table of contents

Ethical Economy, Economic Ethics, Business Ethics: Foundations of Finance Ethics

The Ethical Economy of the Credit Market

The Ethical Economy of the Capital Market

Insider Knowledge and Insider Trading as Central Problems of Finance Ethics

The Ethical Economy of the Market for Corporate Control and for Corporate Know-How

The Ethical Economy of the Market for Derivatives: Trading with Values Derived from Other Values for Hedging, Speculation, and Arbitrage

Interdependences Between the Financial Markets for Credit, Capital, and Derivatives, and the Challenges the Financial Markets Pose for Ethics

The “Banking Secret”, the Right to Privacy, and the Banks’ Duty to Confidentiality

Financial Wagers, Hyper-Speculation and Shareholder Primacy

Financial Overstretch: The Epochal Disturbance of the Invisible Hand of the Market by the Financial Industry