Legendary investor and billionaire philanthropist George Soros, infamous as the "the man who broke the Bank of England" for his role forcing the pound out of Europe's exchange-rate mechanism in 1992, has called for a radical break-up of banks that are "too big to fail." And in backing President Obama's proposed reforms to limit the size of banks, Mr Soros - speaking at a private lunch at the World Economic Forum in Davos - told journalists that Wall Street bankers opposing Mr Obama's plans were "tone-deaf."

Even after the break-up proposed by Mr Obama, most investment banks would "still be too big to fail," Mr Soros told the lunch guests. To contain these banks, he said all major economies would have to agree on a common set of financial regulation that set strict limits for leverage - how much money the banks can borrow to invest. Without a global agreement, capital would simply move to the least regulated country.

However, if all major economies participated, they could exercise the necessary controls over money flow to prevent rogue states from circumventing the system - or stop "Goldman Sachs from setting up shop in Somalia," as one of the participants called it.

Unsurprising, other bankers at the event warned against more regulation. The boss of Barclays Capital, Bob Diamond, said he had "seen no evidence ... to suggest that shrinking banks and making banks smaller and narrower is the answer."