Bull by the Horns is the story of financial calamity seen from the perspective of this public servant, rendered from detailed notes. We learn with whom she met, what was said, what decisions taken, and how things turned out. She begins with the battles over deregulation of the banks (Basel II), with the gathering sub-prime storm, and proceeds through the disaster: WaMu, Wachovia, Citigroup, Bank of America, AIG, Citigroup again. And then the battles of the aftermath, over among other things Dodd-Frank, Basel III and the robosigning frauds. This is a book for aficionados of infuriating detail.

Reuters reported this afternoon that negotiators had reached a deal on the Basel III reforms for international banking, and that on the key question of capital requirements, the range would fall in between 7% and 9%. The press release from the Group of Governors and Heads of Supervision puts that squarely on the low end.

Regulators have competing goals, or at least goals that distract from one another. They want to ensure price transparency for every trade, and exchanges or clearinghouses as the mechanism. But they also should want to increase the swap participants, so that the market doesn’t get concentrated, adding to risk.

This could end well, or with literally no meaningful changes at all. Banks are placing a lot of money to ensure the latter.

enate candidate Alexi Giannoulias (D-IL) has come out expressing support of a measure mandating big bank break-up, albeit with an emphasis elsewhere.