Concept
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The International Monetary Fund (IMF) is an institution created in 1945 under the Bretton-Woods Agreement (which also led to the establishment of the World Bank). Their primary functions relate to lending, technical assistance (education and upskilling), as well as surveillance.
Through lending, the IMF often seeks to influence the lender to introduce some form of financial or structural reform. As lenders, in this context, are countries and not individual people, the IMF exercises significant influence on global financial markets. Therefore, the IMF is not a regulatory authority in the traditional sense, but due to its international reach and size it is able to instigate regulation within the countries to which it lends funds.
For example, in mid-2015 Greece was on the brink of defaulting on its debt obligations. The IMF was willing to extend the Mediterranean nation a substantial loan to help the nation avoid defaulting. However, the IMF would only do so if Greece agreed to implement certain austerity measures. These measures resulted in a lot of social unrest, partly because they included tax hikes on individuals who were either unemployed or underpaid due to the ailing economy.