G20 summit in Toronto
Canada is proud to host the fourth G-20 summit on June 26-27 in Toronto. The Republic of Korea, G-20 Chair for 2010, will host the fifth summit in November in Seoul.
Established in 1999, following the Asian financial crisis in 1997, the G-20 convened annual meetings of finance ministers and central bank governors from Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Republic of Korea, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Turkey, the United Kingdom, the United States and the European Union.
In 2008, G-20 leaders met for the first time in Washington to develop a coordinated response to the global economic crisis. The Washington Summit was followed by summits in London (April 2009) and in Pittsburgh (September 2009), where leaders designated the G-20 as the premier forum for international economic cooperation.
Over the course of the three summits, leaders crafted a coordinated global response to the crisis. They implemented stimulus measures to restore confidence and agreed on actions to strengthen financial regulation. Leaders also committed to reform international financial institutions and agreed to promote trade and resist protectionism. These interventions have been effective in mitigating the impact of the crisis, while encouraging a quicker transition to recovery than could otherwise have been expected.
The G-20 Toronto Summit will provide leaders with an important opportunity to follow through on commitments made at previous summits and to continue the work of building a healthier, stronger and more sustainable global economy.
(Source : Government of Canada)
French statements
- Press confererence, photos on the Elysee website
Official Statements
G-20 Toronto Summit Concludes (June 27, 2010)
Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper concluded the G-20 Toronto Summit with the Chair’s Press Conference on June 27, 2010. Read the documents here to find out the outcome of the Summit…
Statement by the Prime Minister of Canada
G-20 Official Welcome in video
Prime Minister Stephen Harper Launches Small and Medium Entreprise Finance Challenge
Follow all the official statements
Joint letter from Nicolas Sarkozy, President of the Republic, and Angela Merkel, Chancellor of Germany, to Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada¹
Paris - Berlin, 21 June 2010
Dear Prime Minister,
We will be meeting this week in Toronto at a time when the nascent economic recovery could be challenged by renewed financial tensions.
Since our first meeting in Washington in 2008, we have made solid progress in implementing the financial regulatory reform agenda. However, our work is not yet finished. Recent financial turbulences have shown that more needs to be done to ensure financial stability. We must keep up the momentum in implementing our agreed agenda and continue to address the new challenges in a coordinated manner.
We thank you for your letter dated 17 June 2010 outlining an ambitious agenda for actions and decisions in Toronto. We fully share your view that we need to provide clarity and guidance on financial sector reform. We would like to elaborate on the items mentioned in your letter and provide you with ideas for further actions and decisions on some of the agenda items we have discussed in previous meetings.
France and Germany, on the basis of the European Council’s conclusions of 17 June 2010, call for an international agreement to introduce a levy or tax on financial institutions to ensure fair burden-sharing and create incentives designed to contain systemic risks. Such a levy or tax should be part of a credible resolution framework. We believe this levy should be risk-adjusted and address the issue of moral hazard with respect to systemically important institutions.
As an additional element of the financial sector’s contribution, France and Germany will call for work on an international agreement on a global financial market tax, e.g. a financial transaction tax.
We fully agree on the need to strengthen bank capital and liquidity with a view to making the financial system better prepared to withstand shocks. In order to ensure full transparency, the results of ongoing stress tests by banking supervisors should be disclosed; in Europe this will be done at the latest in the second half of July.
Given the potential impact of new capital and liquidity prudential rules on the financing of our economies, we believe they should be appropriately selected, calibrated and phased in so as not to undermine economic recovery. We should therefore aim to implement them by the end of 2012, with sufficient transition periods and appropriate grandfathering clauses.
We agree that we should decide in Toronto to accelerate the implementation of strong measures to improve transparency, regulation and supervision of OTC derivatives, in particular through mandatory reporting, trading on exchanges or electronic trading platforms and clearing through central counterparties. We should also agree to address in a coordinated fashion the specific challenges posed by CDS markets, including sovereign CDS.
In Toronto, we should also commit to pursue vigorously our fight against tax havens, money laundering, corruption, financing of terrorism and non-compliance with internationally agreed prudential standards. We should devise coordinated and appropriate sanctions for those jurisdictions that still do not comply with internationally agreed standards on tax information exchange, money laundering and financing of terrorism.
Since our meeting in London in April 2009, the number of signed Tax Information Exchange Agreements has significantly increased. We should now make sure that these agreements are fully implemented. We should therefore call upon the OECD, in the light of the results of the work conducted by the Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information, to review, by our November 2011 meeting, its list of jurisdictions that do not comply with the internationally agreed standards.
We should make sure that the international institutions and regional development banks join our efforts by reviewing their investment policies vis-à-vis those jurisdictions.
We should also ask the FSB to publish by the end of 2010 a list of jurisdictions that are non-cooperative with regard to internationally agreed prudential standards.
At our meeting in Pittsburgh, we endorsed new Principles and Standards to limit the risk associated with compensation practices in the financial sector. According to the FSB, implementation remains uneven amongst G20 members, which creates competitive distortions and jeopardizes the credibility of the commitments made by the G20. In order to create a level playing field, the FSB should therefore devise implementation guidelines for national regulators and supervisors and monitor implementation by major financial institutions. We should also commit to ensure that every national authority will put appropriate sanctions in place against those financial institutions that do not comply.
Recent events have shown that more work is needed on the supervisory and regulatory framework in order to improve credit rating processes. The lack of competition in the rating market should be assessed and we should ask IOSCO to propose measures to address this issue. In addition, the international code of conduct for credit rating agencies should be supplemented to address the impact that communicating and publishing rating changes may have in terms of amplifying financial turbulences and financial stability. G20 leaders should also ask the FSB to assess by June 2011 the need to reduce the reliance of the regulatory framework on external credit ratings and, if warranted, to suggest ways and means to achieve this objective.
Finally, in order to ensure a level playing field, we believe that all G20 countries should commit to undergo peer reviews conducted by the FSB together with the international standard setters and other international institutions where relevant.
We are sending copies of this letter to the Korean Presidency and G20 Heads of State and Government./.
¹ Source of English text: German Chancellor’s website.
Photos and videos of the Summit
Useful links
Message from the Consulate general of France in Toronto
To know more about the Toronto Police Security Zone during the G20 Toronto Summit, you can go to the G20 Toronto website: http://www.toronto.ca/G20/.The Consulate will be able to answer calls (416-847-1900) during the day on Saturday June 26 and Sunday June 27.
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