Canadian Financial Markets: The Government's Proposal for Reform

Abstract

This paper discusses Canada's financial sector, recent institutional changes, and the Government's recent (April 1985) proposal for financial market reform and its likely impact. Canada's financial markets have been dominated by traditional financial institutions known as the "four pillars". Although traditions and regulations have contributed to the evolution of Canadian financial markets, economic conditions and customer-provided incentives have recently created the major impetus for change. Structural changes have occurred along three separate but related tracks: product and service innovation by banks and near-banks; less market segmentation; and conglomeration. Political pressures have led the federal and provincial governments involved to accommodate the changes that occurred and to encourage changes that were clearly inevitable. The Government of Canada is currently proposing sweeping regulatory reform of financial institutions to encourage more competition for the dominant chartered banks, to establish more effective safeguards to protect consumers, to ban self-dealing, and to insure the stability of the financial system. If implemented, the proposal may alter the traditional roles of financial institutions and their relationship with the federal government.