Emerging Europe

Growth markets on course to overtake old safe havens

Turkey’s relatively strong economic performance looks set to be sustained if fiscal self-discipline and sound banking practices are maintained. Euromoney’s roundtable examines the factors in the country’s favour and potential weaknesses.

Turkey debate: How Turkey can be kept on a sound growth path

Against the odds the sector has weathered the economic downturn and is now poised to show healthy growth as the country emerges from recession. Guy Norton reports.

Managers at Austrian bank RZB and its central and eastern European subsidiary, Raiffeisen International, hope that a merger between the two will help maintain its position as a market leader in the region. Sudip Roy talks to Herbert Stepic, who will lead the newly merged entity.

Skolkovo Moscow School of Management, founded September 2006. Cost of project: $500 million. Financed by $245 million, 10-year credit line from Sberbank. Other backers include oligarch Roman Abramovich, Credit Suisse, Troika Dialog chairman Ruben Vardanian. Formal opening: September 15 2010 by Russian president Dmitry Medvedev. Likelihood of succeeding: 95%

When their traditional German investor base was blown away by the financial crisis, sovereign funding officials in central Europe had to adjust to a world of hefty spreads and hard work. Two years on, their efforts are paying handsome dividends. Lucy Fitzgeorge-Parker reports.

The original owners of Turkey’s banks can be seen from their names. Seker means sugar, Deniz means sea and Ziraat means farming. So Sekerbank was originally owned by the sugar-beet cooperatives, Denizbank was originally owned by fishermen’s cooperatives and Ziraat was founded by a pasha in the Ottoman Empire to provide loans for farmers.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Russia have faced a tough time over the past two years after large corporates and private individuals tightened their belts and once-enthusiastic banks cut back their lending activity as the country went into recession. Consequently, the SME banking segment registered the highest bad loan ratios, which only served to shrink the availability of funding even further.

The country’s banking system breezed through the global financial crisis with an ease few thought possible. Its economy is likely to boom as a trading hub for the region. It is no wonder banks such as HSBC are looking to increase their presence. Nick Lord reports from Istanbul.

Projects such as an elite management school, a Moscow technology park, a nanotechnology fund and plans to turn Moscow into a global financial centre are all designed to move Russia away from dependence on energy and metals productions. How successful will they be? Elliot Wilson reports.

Ever since the sub-prime crisis, global banks have been looking for the big idea that will replace revenues lost with the demise of the structured-finance era. Now they think they’ve found it. Emerging market to emerging market business, they believe, will drive growth for years to come. Where government deals lead, so the private sector and the banking industry will follow. It’s not just about headline M&A deals; it’s every part of a bank’s business, from selling equity to trading bonds. Perhaps the toughest task of all will be to position their own banks’ infrastructure to take full advantage of the new flows that bypass the traditional hubs of global finance. In this brave new world, as Sudip Roy reports, bankers are just as likely to shuttle between Beijing, Moscow and São Paulo as they are from New York to London and Tokyo.

Renaissance Capital’s ambition is to become the world’s pre-eminent emerging markets investment bank. The economic ties that link Asia, Africa and all the states of the former Soviet Union are a new focus. Can its clarity of purpose help RenCap usurp its global competitors? Elliot Wilson reports.

Economic policies geared towards foreign investment; Sovereign Eurobond debut proves a smash hit