“British regulators will have the power to split up banks that fail to separate risky trading activity from retail banking, George Osborne, the country’s chancellor of the Exchequer, said on Monday.

“As part of an overhaul of bank operations, Mr. Osborne said regulators would be able to forcibly separate firms that failed to maintain a division between their retail banking and investment banking units.

“The so-called ring-fencing of consumer deposits from risky trading activity is an effort to reduce the exposure to the wider British economy if one of the country’s largest banks collapses.

“Many of Britain’s largest banks have been engulfed in a series of scandals, and Mr. Osborne said the public was right to be angry over abuses in the country’s financial industry.”

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