International Goldman Man: There's Been Much Improvement Because of the Bailouts

The financial markets are in much better shape than could have been expected a year ago but substantial fragility remains, the head of the Financial Stability Board said on Saturday, according to FT.

Mario Draghi, who heads the FSB, is a member of the Board of Directors of the Bank for International Settlements, heads the central bank of Italy, and was vice chairman and managing director of Goldman Sachs International, said much of the improvement in the financial system was due to extraordinary monetary and fiscal measures, a reference to the billions of dollars of taxpayer money used to bailout financial institutions such as Goldman Sachs.

He was speaking at a media briefing following a plenary meeting of the FSB at the Bank for International Settlements in the Swiss city of Basel.

The FSB is made up of senior representatives of national central banks, regulatory and supervisory authorities and ministries of finance, international financial institutions, standard setting bodies, and committees of central bank experts.

No mention was made by Draghi of the billions of dollars in projects that could not be financed because the money went to Goldman Sachs and the like.