In some ways, the regulatory battles in the United Kingdom have been even more pointed than in the United States. The latest sign is the negative reaction prompted by the news that Bob Diamond has been promoted to CEO of Barclays.

Diamond is seen by many in bank reform circles as being more at home in the free-wheeling trading environment characterized by the New York-based Barclays investment bank. He is certainly not seen as a traditional banker type.

"We are worried about this combination of the casinos and the traditional banking," one critic said on the BBC. "Mr. Diamond illustrates in a particularly graphic way what happens when you have an extremely high paid head of an investment bank taking over one of these major international banks. It does illustrate the wisdom of the government's decision to set up the banking commission to look at the structure of banks," he said.

The battle to break up the universal banks rages in Britain. In many ways, it was a fire looking for fuel. Some high profile regulators would like to split up banks, which has prompted some banks to say they would relocate abroad.

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