Paulson sizes up Wall St disaster defencesBy David Wighton and Paul Taylor in New
York 
Updated: 11:12 p.m. CT Sept 8, 2006
Concerns about Wall Street's ability to withstand a terrorist attack, natural disaster or flu pandemic have prompted Hank Paulson, the new US Treasury secretary, to launch a review of disaster-planning for the financial markets. In one of his first acts in the post, the former Goldman Sachs chief executive has asked the president's working group on financial markets to assess the improvements made since September 11 2001. This comes amid continued Wall Street concerns five years after the World Trade Center attacks about the resilience of power and telecommunications services. September 11 exposed weaknesses in the industry's disaster planning and closed the equity market for four days. Experts say financial services companies in New York and London have improved the resilience of their operations. But some senior Wall Street figures are concerned that the utilities, on which the financial markets depend, have made less progress. There is also greater focus on the impact of a flu pandemic. Scott Parsons, US deputy assistant Treasury secretary, said the utilities had made "tremendous improvements" but added: "We remain concerned about how to provide better resilience in telecommunications, which is the financial sector's single biggest dependency." Wall Street firms blamed many of their problems in 2001 on the damage to one of Verizon Communications' five switching centres in lower Manhattan. Some Wall Street disaster planners believe more pressure needs to be put on the utilities by their regulators. They are encouraged by the early interest taken byMr Paulson, who was involved in the issue at Goldman Sachs. Recently, many financial services companies and regulators have focused on their ability to operate in the event of a flu pandemic when many staff would want to work from home. Complete archives at http://www.sitbot.net/ Please let us stay on topic and be civil. OM
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