Head of credit research, Gartmore

Few capital markets participants will be sorry to see the back of 2002. Fear dominated the year: fear of more terrorist attacks, fear of the consequences of a war against Iraq, fear of more corporate scandals, fear of losing yet more money, fear of losing one's job, fear of going to jail.

Citibank opened its first retail branch in Moscow in November as Russia's leading commercial banks begin to slug it out for Russia's retail banking business.

Russia’s central bank is launching a controversial new scheme aimed at creating stability and competition. Deputy central bank chairman Andrei Kozlov explains why the reforms are needed.

A pioneer of foreign investment in post-Soviet Russia, Bill Browder has battled with corporate misdeeds and tracked the “bad guys” to take his Hermitage fund up 446% since 1996.

Indonesia

Is the burgeoning credit derivatives market still best seen as a hedging device? Or have some participants turned it to unfair advantage over bond investors on the basis of what amounts to inside information?

Years of heavy losses from traditional assets are prompting investors to seek new havens for their money. Overlay managers sing the praises of going beyond hedging to invest actively in forex.

When André Perold, professor of financial management at Harvard Business School visited JP Morgan Investment Management in 1987, it was a momentous occasion for Adrian Lee, president and CIO at Lee Overlay Partners, who was then working at JPMIM.

Few people know currency overlay - an industry always on the verge of maturing - better than Neil Record, chairman and CEO of Record Currency Management. According to Mercer Investment Consulting, the company he started was awarded the world's first currency overlay mandate in 1985, when the Water Authority Superannuation Fund asked it to implement a dollar-based hedge.

CEO, Duke Street Capital

A recent UK court judgment has stopped minority lenders blocking a workout because it is not in their interests. Rob Mannix explains why the ruling is good news for the banking industry

Lehman Brothers' trials and tribulations with its wayward chef continue (see Euromoney, November 2002).

Riba, Gharar, Murabaha, abba, Ijarah, Salam, Istina, Sukuk, Mudarabah, Musharaka, Takaful