Hoban warns Brussels over 'disproportionate' regulation The minister, who was in Brussels to meet with Michel Barnier, the European Union's internal market commissioner responsible for some of Brussels" most controversial financial rules, said the wrong regulation "stifles growth, restricts investment, lowers business returns and imposes higher costs on investors and consumers alike." He added: "In a global financial market, where capital is highly mobile, disproportionate and poor regulation will simply drive good capital to other destinations outside of Europe to the cost of European savers, investors and businesses." In a thinly disguised attack on European leaders who blame Britain and America for the financial crisis, Mr Hoban said: "2008 wasn't an Anglo-Saxon crisis, it was a universal crisis that has come at great cost to us all through rescuing failed banks and providing hundreds of billions of euros in guarantees and other support." "We are committed to robust regulatory reform both at home and abroad," he said. In the UK we have already set in motion an ambitious agenda of regulatory reform. Mr Hoban also warned Europe not to try to dilute the Basel III rules designed to force banks to build up capital reserves. Under the rules, European banks will have to hold core capital of at least 7pc of their assets by 2019. "It is vital that we resist any attempts to unpick this agreement in Europe through the Capital Requirements Directive," he said. Mr Barnier has angered Britain by backing the Alternative Investment Fund Managers Directive (AIFM) which aimed to curb hedge funds, the majority of which are based in London.