Abstract: Systemically Important Financial Institutions (SIFIs) refer to those financial institutions whose distress or disorderly failure, because of their size, complexity and systemic interconnectedness, would cause significant disruption to the wider financial system and economic activity. The regulation of SIFIs is an integral part of the international regulatory reform ever since the global financial crisis. The series of documents adopted by the Financial Stability Board in conjunction with other relevant international standard setting bodies have laid the foundation for the international regulation of SIFIs. The contents of such documents can be summarized as establishing the identification criteria and appraisal approaches of SIFIs, increasing the regulatory intensity and effectiveness, and establishing and implementing proper resolution regimes. The regulatory work to date has taken a gradual approach, i.e., from international to domestic, and from banks to non-bank financial institutions, and is becoming more diversified and complicated.

Key words: systemically important financial institutions, global systemically important financial institutions, domestic systemically important financial institutions, SIFI, G-SIFI, D-SIFI

Published in Journal of International Economic Law, Vol.20, No.1, May, 2013.