WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Group of 20 nations meeting next week is a "make or break event" for global markets, investor George Soros said on Wednesday.
"Unless it comes up with practical measures to support the countries at the periphery of the global financial system, markets are going to suffer another sinking spell just as they did on February 10, 2009, when the authorities failed to produce practical measures to recapitalize the United States banking system," Soros said in testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
At the periphery of the world's financial system are developing countries ranging from Eastern Europe to Africa, he said.
While the United States wanted to reinflate, and Europe wanted to regulate, "it should be possible to find common ground in the need to protect the periphery countries from a calamity that is not of their own making," he said.
"Actually we need to both reinflate and regulate but reinflation is urgent and regulatory reforms will take time to implement," Soros said.
He said the urgent task has to be carried out mainly by the International Monetary Fund, "imperfect and beleaguered as it is, because it is the only institution available."
(Editing by Leslie Adler)