In an op-ed published in the Financial Times this morning, Senator Warner argues for a single regulator to be in charge of overseeing the banking industry.

Right now, the U.S. has multiple regulatory agencies with overlapping jurisdiction over the same banks.  As Senator Warner writes:

As complicated as this may appear it has a clear consequence: it would allow financial groups to continue to shop for the weakest regulator. ... This system is inefficient, unaccountable, and expensive to administer. It is inconsistent in its approach and would be uneven in its results. It is poorly equipped to identify industry-wide trends and conditions early. Competition among federal regulators makes no more sense in banking than in food safety or air traffic control.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner has proposed combining the Office of Thrift Supervision (OTS) and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC).  But Senator Warner believes the Obama Administration should go even further, creating a single banking regulator:  

We need a single agency combining the OTS and OCC while absorbing the responsibilities of the FDIC and Federal Reserve for prudential regulation and supervision of banks and their holding companies, affiliates and subsidiaries. This agency should have a level of independence commensurate with the FDIC and Federal Reserve (including an independent chair) with the authority to oversee banks from top to bottom and end to end.

Click here to read the entire op-ed.

Senator Warner, who is a member of the Senate Banking Committee, has been vocal on the need to reform the way we regulate the banking industry.  In June, he wrote an op-ed in the Washington Post arguing for the creation of a systemic risk council to monitor institutions before they become "too big to fail."