Comptroller of the Currency John Dugan said today that the central challenge for bank regulators over the coming year will be to strike the right balance between capital and credit availability. He points to BASEL II Capital Requirements Directives as potentially helping US banks manage risk effectively. The Bank for International Settlements is charged with implementing the standards of BASEL II, so it may not hurt to begin to become familiar with their quarterly reports. Today’s report attributes the fall in asset prices between mid-January and mid-February to, among other factors, the unevenness of the global economic recovery and concerns about sovereign credit risk in the light of large fiscal deficits.