Financial Transparency Coalition

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP),has a budget of roughly $5 billion, and operates about 6,000 foreign aid projects throughout the world. Last year, UNDP decided that it wanted to be more transparent in reporting what it does to the world. It got a $225,000 grant (Hat tip: Corruption Currents) to create a cool new web app:

Integrity, trust and culture can seem like the most intangible and abstract of concepts in a hard-edged business environment – until they disappear. As the finance industry has discovered in recent years, failing to tend to a culture of integrity can cost you dearly. There are the record fines of course – such as those meted out to Goldman Sachs, Barclays and UBS – and they have grabbed most of the headlines. But there is also the incalculable reputational damage, which in the longer term can have a very tangible impact in terms of lost customers, investment and contracts.

This week TIME Magazine opened polling to their readers to weigh in on their nominations for Person of the Year. Generally, I think their picks are pretty good, although sometimes their nominations are a little off the mark (Roger Goodell, really?). Anyway, the nominations got me to thinking what a Transparency Person of the Year would look like. Keeping with TIME’s definition, this would be someone who influenced the news, for better or worse, on issues related to financial transparency. Here are my picks. CARL LEVIN. I’m going to go with the most obvious one first. If I did this...

We often approach transparency laws from an anti-corruption, anti-tax evasion perspective here on the Task Force blog. But recent transparency regulations, like the recent oil, gas, and mining rules made active this month by the Securities and Exchange Commission, are also good for business. They will provide investors, creditors, and other financial actors with clear, verifiable, easily accessible data in which to make decisions. This will make markets more efficient, leading to better economic outcomes for all.