In a detailed and thorough review of the causes of the global financial crisis, ex-Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan acknowledged a series of regulatory failures, but strongly shunned the commonly held thought that the central bank had left the interest rates at too low a level, for too long.

"We had been lulled into a sense of complacency by the modestly negative economic aftermaths of the stock market crash of 1987 and the dotcom boom. Given history, we believed that any declines in home prices would be gradual. Destabilizing debt problems were not perceived to arise under those conditions", Mr. Greenspan said.

The thoughts were shared by Mr. Greenspan in his paper "The Crisis", which will soon be presented by him on Friday at a Brookings Institution conference.

The global financial crisis has ended up badly damaging Mr. Greenspan's reputation. When he left the office in January of 2006, he was cheered as one of the greatest central bankers the world had ever seen, but today, he is blamed by many for supporting deregulation and keeping interest rates dangerously low during the 1990s and 2000s.

Mr. Greenspan's latest paper is yet another attempt by him to defend his decisions.