Guide to the most crucial bank meeting you never heard of

By Kevin G. Hall | McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON — International bank regulators from around the globe will meet in the Swiss town of Basel on Sunday to finalize an important agreement that most Americans have never heard of: one to redraw rules so that banks can't bring the world economy to the brink of collapse again.

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke is leading the U.S. delegation to the so-called Basel III talks. The assembled bank regulators are expected to agree to impose higher capital requirements on big banks. This would force them to keep more money in reserve to cushion against losses, one of the lessons of the near-meltdown in 2008, when banks had far more toxic assets on their books than funds to protect themselves against a downturn.