The final contours of the legislation on financial reform that is being enacted in the US are now clear. If the objective was to tackle the most egregious excesses of a wildly out-of-control sector, the bill that will eventually emerge is a reasonable effort. If the goal, however, is to conceive of and develop a 21st century financial sector that is an aid to the real economy and that assists in creating widespread prosperity, then this effort should be seen as a cynical attempt that will fail to do the needful. Proponents of this view suggest that the approach adopted has been regulatory as opposed to structural. The reform process has progressed as if the fundamental problem was a lack of prudential regulations as opposed to the actual social functioning of the financial system in the US.