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In the last five years, there have in fact been a significant number of new guidelines, laws, drafts and recommendations. The banks were forced to increase the size of their financial cushions, for example, but they still aren't large enough. Regulators devised split banking systems designed to shield customer deposits from risky trading activities, but the concepts are half-baked and have yet to be fully implemented.

The leading industrialized nations agree that banks should be liquidated in accordance with clear rules -- and without adversely affecting taxpayers, if at all possible. Nevertheless, there are still no uniform international principles to achieve this goal. Most countries don't even have an insolvency statute for the industry.

Bankers' bonuses were capped, but then their fixed salaries were increased dramatically. Regulators had vowed to rein in the rampant trade in derivatives among banks by requiring it to be conducted on supervised exchanges. Instead, the over-the-counter derivatives market has grown by 20 percent since 2009.

Over the years, lawmakers have lost sight of the most important objectives of regulation. Secure savings deposits, a continuous supply of credit and a functioning payment transaction system are as important to an economy as intact water pipes or power grids. The point is to ensure that this supply functions properly. At the same time, governments and taxpayers cannot allow themselves to be held hostage by the banks, merely because they can guarantee a basic supply of capital.

"What is needed is fundamental structural change, which, as in other industries, costs money. Lawmakers shy away from that," says Clemens Fuest, President of the Center for European Economic Research (ZEW).

Financial industry executives take every opportunity to warn that if regulators take aim at financial groups, then businesses, savers and investors will ultimately suffer.