48. The global banking system entered the crisis with an insufficient level of high quality capital. The crisis also revealed the inconsistency in the definition of capital across jurisdictions and the lack of disclosure that would have enabled the market to fully assess and compare the quality of capital across jurisdictions. A key element of the new definition of capital is the greater focus on common equity, the highest quality component of a bank's capital.
Version date: 1 June 2011 - onwards