Costs are rising in Asian private banking but the vast and untapped pools of wealth in the region mean that it is still a highly attractive business proposition. The adverse market environment will further reduce margins. However, on a long-term basis the opportunities are too good to miss. Helen Avery reports.

Last month Euromoney wrote about how the valuations service sector was heating up. Financial data provider Markit subsequently announced a new multi-dealer valuations platform. Chief executive Lance Uggla explains to Alex Chambers how the firm is broadening its offerings from credit to OTC equities.

Abu Dhabi wants to be a global capital city: a pleasant hub for industry and high-class tourism. To attain that goal, it is looking for outside investment. But despite a stated desire for more independent business, the ruling family is still omnipresent.

Highly levered funds are always at the mercy of credit and liquidity suppliers. So be wary of those active in markets where liquidity can rapidly dry up, says Neil Wilson.

There are signs that Venezuela is moving away from the plummeting dollar for some of its oil contracts. Energy minister Rafael Ramírez said last month that his country would insist on payments in euros on some contracts. Ramírez declined to give further details, although the move is bound to further damage relations with the US government. Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez has been critical of the Bush administration’s economic policy, blaming it for the dollar’s slump. He wants Opec members to move from pricing oil in dollars to a basket of currencies.

Accusations of sharp practice are flying as the loan market struggles to deal with its problems.

"It is an inauspicious year because the rat year brings about slower world economies where unemployment, money matters and environment matters would be the key issues. There would be plenty of natural disasters/diseases which could affect the world."

The Fed is finding innovative ways to fund US financial institutions to combat the systemic risk that has done for Bear Stearns.

Shinsei Bank is to sell the headquarters building it inherited from its previous incarnation, Long-Term Credit Bank of Japan, in order to avoid booking a net loss for a second consecutive fiscal year. The ¥118 billion ($1.18 billion) sale is to a real estate fund managed by Morgan Stanley, and will help to offset the total of ¥32.5 billion of sub-prime related losses announced by the bank so far. The bank says it will rent the space for the next three years while it searches for a more cost-efficient base. This continues a recent trend of banks selling their Tokyo headquarters, with Resona announcing on March 11 that it is seeking a buyer for its Otemachi base. Meanwhile market participants wonder what Morgan Stanley knows about Tokyo property that they don’t: in addition to its participation in the Shinsei deal, the US bank bought Citi’s Shinagawa HQ in February for just over $1 billion.

Icap’s launch of an insurance derivatives and securities broking joint venture will promote liquidity and transparency in this fast-growing niche. If new sources of capital prove resilient to soft markets, insurers may see them as a new strategic challenge.

ECBC plenary meeting divided about how to handle market making.

Rating agency considers wider implications of CDO methodology change.

Market participants say that the borrowing binge by Russian banks and corporates in recent years could come back to haunt them, given the much tighter credit market conditions in 2008.

In one of his last acts before his bank was bought by Barclays for £373 million last month, Expobank chairman Kirill Yakubovskiy persuaded 12 of his female staff to strip off for a racy calendar. Ranging from secretaries to senior executives and aged between 20 and 33, Expo’s finest fillies didn’t leave much to the imagination. Senior manager Maria Guterman is Miss January, wearing a tray of enticing cakes and little else, while Miss February is network sales manager Yevgenia Trusilova, bending over a kitchen counter alongside the phrase "we work under your personal request". It will be of considerable comfort to John Varley that his vehicle for emerging market expansion can boast such great figures.

"It is very hard to distinguish a catastrophe CDO from any other type of CDO in this market – aren’t all CDOs catastrophes?"

Rapid growth can mean rising inflation, as Vietnam is discovering.

Bankers at HSBC’s Canary Wharf headquarters have issued a damning verdict on their own staff canteen by adding a review of it to the popular London restaurant guide London Eating, giving it an overall score of just 2.5/10.

We are engulfed in a tornado of gloom. Wall Street titans and employees alike have seen their share options decimated, pension pots plummet and everyone feels insecure about job security. I’m hearing that investment banks need to cut 20% of their employees to accommodate lower profitability.

While investment bankers in the west expect a difficult 2008, counterparts in Asia cite the successful closing of buyouts, bond issuances and IPOs during the market turmoil as proof of the region’s opportunities. Lawrence White reports.

But lenders will price to encourage trading.

Measures to boost the competitiveness of Brazil’s exporters might well be fruitless.

Far from solving BAA’s financial problems, the CAA’s regulatory review will make life for it even worse.

A merger of BNP Paribas and Société Générale would be difficult to fund and to execute.

All market participants must still confront the reality of near total market failure across the debt and money markets, an inability to sell even quality assets for cash or to borrow against them and a complete loss of faith between financial institutions. More public money is surely coming, but how can it repair this?

Unless Japan gets more involved in international capital markets, perhaps through a sovereign wealth fund, it is likely to become increasingly irrelevant in Asian finance.

The covered bond market has not behaved in the way investors had been led to believe it would. It’s time to realize that covered bonds are not the golden child of the bond family.

It’s pitiful trying to blame short sellers for the woes of the financial system.

Are banks biting the hand that feeds them? Perhaps, but what choice do they have?

If there’s another Bear Stearns or Northern Rock-style blow-up, will any other bank be willing or able to pick up the pieces?