The election of Donald Trump may allow banks to dodge the full impact of global regulators' post-2008 crisis crackdown.

The Basel Committee on Banking Supervision is racing to complete a revamp of international capital standards by year-end. The U.S. has pushed for strict rules to protect against future market meltdowns, while Europe and Japan want to rein in proposals that could hit banks with billions in costs. Basel Committee members including the U.S. Federal Reserve and the European Central Bank are under enormous industry pressure to soften the rules.

Trump's ascendancy and his vow to dismantle financial regulations could throw another wrench in the works. If he stalls U.S. implementation of the revised Basel Committee standards on how banks measure asset risk, or ignores them altogether, Europe could follow suit. And if the U.S. and Europe go their own ways, the last piece of the global response to the financial crisis could be undermined.