The landscape of the Italian banking market has been completely redrawn over the past 12 months but consolidation remains work in progress.

Europe’s supranational and agency borrowers are becoming ever bigger issuers in the international capital markets even as their historical missions appear to have been met and the banking and financial market to have matured enough to finance at commercial rates most of the lending risks the agencies assume. The debate as to whether these subsidized institutions distort or complement the capital markets continues unabated, as private lenders submit to capital adequacy directives that do not extend to the agencies. Alex Chambers reports.

Markets used to move at the hint of change in the political landscape. These days, surprise election results seem to have little or no impact.

"The bosses of Europe’s big three stock exchanges, the LSE, Deutsche Börse and Euronext, deserve to have their heads knocked together. They appear to have let their egos get in the way of getting together and forming a genuine European powerhouse."

Although benchmarking has a part to play in some areas, there is no single approach to best execution that suits all markets.

Further regulation on delivery needed, says consultant.

The possibility that the long end of the US yield curve might continue to invert has supported long-end issuance from international sovereign and supranational issuers.

While the current stage in the leverage cycle benefits corporate borrowers, concern has been raised about the protection that bondholders receive against declining ratings and event risk. Does good corporate governance have anything to offer this set of stakeholders, and should it have? Florian Neuhof reports.

IMF: Singapore welcomes the right sort of people

Qatari bank aims to become world’s largest Islamic player after IPO.

From a research note entitled The largest OTC exchange

“When you talk about leasing, everyone thinks you’re talking about cars. My mother-in-law thinks I sell cars for a living”

Do superheroes need financial advice, and if so, how do you go about giving it?

Graduation day might be approaching for some of the larger companies listed on London’s AIM (Alternative Investment Market) but the sheer volume of competitors means some might not make the cut.

In contrast to the US, where supply is lacklustre and only just ahead of 2005 volumes, it will be a hectic last quarter in the European securitization market. Last year in November the market saw an incredible supply of €60 billion. Bankers expect that number to be easily matched this time around and maybe even surpassed. In fact 2006 total issuance is already 20% ahead of last year. In addition to jumbo UK RMBS, which is forecast by syndicate officials to figure highly, balance sheet CLO issuance from the likes of RBS, HSBC, Barclays and ABN is also said to be lined up.

FXMarketSpace has made four senior appointments as it gears up for its launch in 2007. Two of the appointments, Jane Forster and Dan Rosenberg, have been lured from rival EBS. Yigal Oren moves over from Reuters, FXMarketSpace’s 50% owner, and Debra Rabichow comes from futures commission merchant Goldenberg, Heymer & Co.

Likelihood of “ratings shopping” by borrowers/dealers increases.

Arab Bank has bought a 50% stake in Turkey’s MNG Bank, as part of its expansion plans. MNG Bank was established in 1991, and offers retail banking and capital markets services through 11 branches across Turkey.

Investigations into the backdating of stock options has caused around half of the more than 100 companies under scrutiny by the SEC and/or the Department of Justice to miss deadlines for filing earnings. More are likely to follow, says Todd Fernandez, senior analyst at independent institutional research firm Glass Lewis & Co.

Sovereign liability management exercises continued apace last month in the region, with Brazil, Colombia and Uruguay executing either debt swaps or local-currency deals. Strong market conditions are encouraging sovereigns to clean up their yield curves or reduce their foreign exchange exposure in favour of local currency. Brazil issued a R$1.6 billion ($750 million) global bond denominated in reais. It was the sovereign’s second such deal. Colombia followed with a $1 billion offering of 2037s. Part of the proceeds will be used to buy back up to $700 million of global bonds. Finally, Uruguay entered the market with a $400 million-equivalent inflation-indexed peso bond.

The return of hard underwriting on recent bond deals underscores how mundane and risk-free the business had become.

Hedge fund rating is a noble goal but Moody’s and S&P’s approaches fail to fill the bill.

More than two years after the enlargement of the European Union, many large equity investors remain convinced that the combined equity markets of central and eastern Europe are too small for them to invest in, despite a combined equity market capitalization of €211 billion at the end of 2005.

The debt burden is a growing worry, not least because many of those that invest in the debt market’s increasingly ingeniously packaged instruments are themselves heavily leveraged.

There has been no relief from the pressures that last year’s annual cash management poll detected: globalization, declining margins and intensified competition. Smaller banks face a choice between expanding to compete or forming difficult-to-implement partnerships. Some might soon begin to question whether all the effort is worthwhile. Lawrence White reports.

Stocks traded on emerging market stock exchanges now account for 16% of global equities, according to Standard & Poor’s. However, despite these stocks’ growing weight and in many cases improvements in transparency and corporate governance, investors remain fickle. According to data from Emerging Portfolio Fund Research, a fund flows tracker, investors pulled $15 billion from emerging market stocks between mid-May and mid-September, reducing the year-to-date cumulative inflow to $17 billion.

Although NYSE member firms that conduct business with the public reported second-quarter 2006 after-tax profits of $2.95 billion and revenues of $78.64 billion, up from $1.13 billion and $53.32 billion in the second quarter of 2005, specialists reported a fall in both after tax profit and revenue. For the second quarter of 2006, NYSE specialists reported after-tax profit of just $26 million. During the same period in 2005, the specialists reported an after-tax profit of $33 million. Total specialist revenue in Q2 of 2006 was $215 million, compared with $220 million in Q2 of 2005.

Benefit of hedge fund ratings to investors is questionable.

Czech financial group PPF Group has bought three banks in Ukraine – PrivatInvest, PrivatKredit and Bank Agrobank – paying $18 million for the PrivatInvest acquisition.

Barclays Capital has identified a budding mortgage-backed securities market as one of the key reasons for its decision to open an investment banking and broker-dealer business in Mexico. The UK bank started operations in Mexico last month with $100 million in capital. Barcap also hopes to take advantage of the fast-growing local capital markets, as more companies seek to raise money through high-yielding peso-denominated bonds.