Here is a conundrum. The financial services industry does not enjoy a good reputation with the public. Yet the services that it provides are absolutely essential to our economy and prosperity.

Indeed, they are so important that pioneers in the world of finance often saw themselves as philanthropists. As recently as 2006, a Nobel prize - not for economics but for peace - was awarded to a financier, Muhammad Yunus, whose pioneering work in micro-finance has relieved poverty and improved the lives of millions.