There is certainly a willingness to cooperate on macroeconomic issues, especially economic growth; however, the reality is that not much is happening on that front. There is no common attempt to reboot global economic growth at the G20, despite the rhetoric. In terms of monetary cooperation, there is nothing happening on that front from what I can observe. China has decided to unilaterally devalue its currency, which seems to have caught everyone by surprise. The euro zone and the US are continuing with monetary easing although there have been indications, at least in the US, that it would come to an end very soon. There are certainly no coordination attempts here. Finally, IMF reforms and sovereign debt restructuring also seem to be stuck, even if negotiations are ongoing.

The FSB continues to perform its coordinating work as best as it can, given its lack of enforcement capability and small secretariat. It continues to pushes for regulation into new areas like shadow banking. So progress continues to be made but the main issue remains the "complete and consistent" implementation of international standards at the domestic level, though monitoring by the FSB and IMF helps identify inconsistencies.

The calls for progress are there but the action is missing. It seems that implementation of the Bali package will take time. Reforms to the WTO's decision-making procedures remain at the proposal stage. Negotiations for bilateral or regional trade agreements like TTIP continue while there is no attempt to streamline the rules governing international trade at the WTO. This means that businesses are facing increasingly complex and overlapping rules when it comes to international trade. A point may soon be reached whereby the transactions costs associated with the "spaghetti bowl" may overcome the benefits associated with free trade agreements.