The presentation last week by the Central Bank of Malta of its Annual Report was very poorly attended by the media and even poorer reported upon.

This is what happens wherever anything approaching a serious matter in financial services is involved and where the usual tit-for-tat soundbites are absent.

Even in our case, and we had a 1,900-word report, there were things that were left unsaid mostly due to the absence of space. In this leader, we will be attempting to set things right.

A member of the audience asked about Brexit and its likely impact on the Maltese economy. He was told the Central Bank has concluded its own studies . Malta today is less exposed to UK exports than it was, say, in the 1980s. In the case of a hard Brexit, for instance, a dip in the UK's GDP of 10% would only affect some 0.5% of the Maltese GDP.

The CBM speakers seemed more interested in replying to a New York Times report some weeks back that mixed up the figures of foreign banks in Malta and came up with the wrong analysis.

This paper asked the panel why the Governor of the Central Bank of Malta did not come up with a statement such as that made by the Governor of the Bank of England and the President of the Bank of France with regards to climate change. The reply was that no one had invited the Maltese representative.

That having been said, they replied that CBM is preparing its own climate change policy which it will be announcing in the coming weeks.

A question which referred 'en passant' to Malta's reputational difficulties, on the lines as outlined by the HSBC CEO in recent weeks, went completely unanswered while the CBM panel continued to insist on the banks doing due diligence and Know Your Client procedures to the best of their abilities.

The upshot of all this is that, once again, the top levels of the local regulatory bodies steadfastly refuse to see what is clear to most other people and in this case to see the damage that has been caused to Malta's reputation in the financial services sector because of all the allegations that have been made with regard to the sector and which have made Malta a toxic name in international circles where reputation  is so important.

We find the same attitude in MFSA, for instance, and in other regulatory bodies. Such an attitude makes sense, seeing the enormous power the government has in appointing, removing and otherwise managing these people and what they do.

It is instructive, in this regard, what has happened, is happening, right at this moment with regards to appointments to the judiciary where the government says it agrees with the conclusions of the Venice Committee of the Council of Europe, but not immediately, thus continuing to stuff the benches with partisan appointments.

Partisan appointments are the blight of any regulatory body which cannot be considered free to take any decision without undue interference from the powers that be, the powers that are supposed to be regulated.