Frits Bolkestein: BIS shelters money for dictators and deadbeats

The BIS has played a vital role in creating a more stable and predictable international monetary system. Unfortunately, the fact that both the BIS and its customers have immunity from international jurisdiction and regulation provides an unintended legal loophole to regimes that care very little for the solidity of the international monetary system. From last year's Wikileaks scandal, we know that in the mid-1990s, Nigerian dictator Sani Abacha used that same legal loophole to store billions of dollars that he had stolen from his own people at the BIS, thus protecting it from litigation.

Which brings us to Argentina. Following its 2001 default, that country's central bank openly began transferring large parts of its capital reserves to the BIS, a process that accelerated after Argentina's 2005 debt restructuring. And indeed, even on the eve of the 2001 default, Buenos Aires announced its intention to move assets to other institutions such as the BIS, where they would be beyond the reach of creditors. Today, the Argentine central bank holds $45 billion in its account at the BIS -- a staggering 86% of Argentina's total capital reserves. By comparison, the size of other central banks' average deposits held at the BIS is a mere 4% of their total capital reserves.