Professor Edward Kane:

You probably know that there is something called a G-SIFI, a globally significant financial institution. These are designated and there are approximately 28 or 29 of them. It is a little misleading to treat too-big-to-fail as if it is an on-off condition. Institutions try to make it harder for them to fail politically, economically and administratively. A firm can be made more complex such that it scares would-be regulators from taking it over. Clearly, the top ten US banks are too big to fail.